Originally published at: Comparing altitudes between Virgin Galactic, Blue Origin, and SpaceX | Boing Boing
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Requisite musk fanboy post. Only SpaceX is purposed for doing real useful work. The rest is adventure tourism for the super rich.
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Needs more Shepard (Alan) and Gemini.
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And this really understates the difference between going into orbit, and just shooting up and falling back down. The speed that you have to be going to maintain orbit means that the Δv, (acceleration * how long you accelerate) is MUCH higher to reach orbit. Short of that, and you’re just on an amusement park ride.
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So how long before somebody replaces each of those little yellow lines with images of dildos? But then, searching for that graphic would probably be a bad idea.
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So… Elon has the largest penis?
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will the dick measuring between these billionaire flyboys ever end?
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And Yuri Gagarin’s flight in Vostok 1 had an apogee of 177 miles in 1961.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vostok_1
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I know someone who works at a company that contracts with SpaceX to deliver payloads. SpaceX is actually one of the bumpier options and so you can’t use it for your most sensitive equipment. So, ironically, a billionaire created the “coach” of space travel. But it is cost effective!
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As usual, there’s an XKCD. This one has a great explanation.
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As a Kerbal Space Program veteran, I can attest that to achieve orbit, you need to fly up to altitude and then TURN RIGHT, and burn a few thousand m/s.
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Blue Origin is working on reusable orbital rockets, too.
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I’m an engineering professor at a school in the general neighborhood of SpaceX, and I’ve been watching how they recruit and what happens to the young engineers that go to work there. They are aggressively recruiting the best and brightest, giving them really interesting work to do, and working their asses off. A lot of people only spend a few years there, but it becomes a calling card for them and really opens doors later in their careers.
This is just to say that Musk aside, SpaxeX looks like a Serious Aerospace Company as opposed to a toy maker. I’m pretty excited about their future, especially post-Musk.
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Considering they still haven’t delivered on those orbital rocket engines they sold to ULA for the Vulcan, I’ll agree with that statement when I see one delivered, otherwise it’s like a lawsuit, an allegation.
Say what you will about Elon Musk, but he at least bankrolled a company that tried for orbit from the get-go, and has actually made Old Space companies like Boeing change, at least somewhat, how they do business.
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Read that as attitudes first… but it looks like this thread is about to cover that as well.
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I feel like this info graphic is missing almost all valuable context. It seems to be showing maximum achieved altitude of human flight for these companies, but it doesn’t actually say that anywhere. It ignores the difference between reaching and altitude and maintaining it. And it ignores what SpaceX could do, but has no reason to. The Falcon Heavy should be able to get a Dragon spacecraft to geostationary transfer orbit, there is just nothing there to send people to.
I’d also assume Blue Origin could do more than they did, but I don’t think they could get regulatory approval to travel downrange from their inland launch site.
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Also: orbit = way high, way fast, parabolic = meh.
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Well remember, your attitude controls your altitude
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