Another reason not to live near Boca Chica: launch noise levels substantially louder than approved, likely reaching over 120dB at 3 miles. “Starbase” tracking and operations complex is only 2 miles away, and small cities Port Isabel (pop. 5000) and South Padre Island (pop. 2-3000) are only 6 to 8 miles away. Now hiring: window glaziers…
Prediction from local eco-investigator blog from before launch:
BBC report mostly on SLS/Artemis (about half the thrust of Starship/Super Heavy) which measured 129 decibels at 3.2 miles:
So those of us in the northern part of the U.S. and Canada have a decent shot to see the aurora boreal is tonight - and not just localized in your kitchen! Check the link to see if you might have a good view -
dtolman
5839
Right now its visible across the UK, northern Europe - and I just saw a photograph of it taken in Maryland. So its visible across most of the US right now - even if you don’t see it take a long exposure and see if the northern horizon is glowing red - it may be visible to your camera!
Goddamn overcast PNW skies.
abrandt
5841
Cloudy here too. Supposed to clear up later overnight but don’t know if both me and the aurora will make it that long.
Yeah that didn’t turn out so great, at least where I live. Hopefully some of you got to see something though!
It was visible as far south as the Mojave Desert.
— Alan
Djscman
5844
A Japanese private company tried landing a lunar probe today. They lost contact.
https://wapo.st/3oL1Zgx
(Gift link)
Japanese start-up loses contact with spacecraft during moon landing
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/04/25/moon-landing-robot-ispace/
Speaking of the moon, this article was a good overview of the future NASA Moon-orbiting space station Gateway:
Hopefully that project will meet with more success than this new lunar crater.
dtolman
5845
The probe was going at max 40 kph when it landed - so probably no crater… just a cracked box with some banged up components.
Djscman
5846
Huh, I wonder if it can be recovered by future astronauts, then.
Fellow space nerds, you’ll want to read this detailed look at JPL and the challenges they face.
Gifted link.
https://wapo.st/44lWAgt
This is pretty cool also.
This is a good illustration of why SpaceX has a realistic prospect of making their Starship second-stage reusable (which would be a huge advance): they have an incredibly rich trove of data from the hypersonic regime, with telemetry from hundreds of re-entering Falcon stages.
