Fifty-mile per winds broke the moorings and blew over the SpaceX Starhopper. It will take a few weeks to repair according to Elon Musk.
The SpaceX Starhopper is designed to test three new Raptor engines. Raptor engines are nearly twice as powerful as current SpaceX Merlin engines.
After the Starhopper performs a series of tests up to about 5000 meters, then SpaceX will complete and then being testing prototypes capable of reaching orbit.
Around the middle of 2019, will complete and build the upper stage Starship and the lower booster Super-Heavy. Combined the two halves will be completely reusable.
Currently SpaceX does not recover the second stage of the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy. The Falcon 9 can be about 80% reusable with the recovery and reuse of the first stage and the faring. The nose cone faring has been recovered but has not been reused.
The SpaceX Falcon Heavy would be about 92% reusable if all three first stages and the faring are reused. The SpaceX Falcon Heavy could demonstrate reuse of three first stages by April or May of 2019.
The picture of the blown over SpaceX Starhopper are from tweets by Cowboy Dan.
I just heard. 50 mph winds broke the mooring blocks late last night & fairing was blown over. Will take a few weeks to repair.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 23, 2019
Image from a few days ago when the nose cone was standing.
… and it appears either #SpaceX lowered #StarHopper‘s nosecone section down last night, or the wind gusts apparently got it. pic.twitter.com/nVCM4RV8OV
— Cowboy Dan (@CowboyDanPaasch) January 23, 2019
Kimi Talvitie had renderings of the Starhopper and stainless steel renderings of the Starship and Super Heavy.
Brian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a popular Science blogger with 1 million readers per month. His blog Nextbigfuture.com is ranked #1 Science News Blog. It covers many disruptive technology and trends including Space, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Medicine, Anti-aging Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology.
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