Starship stacked on top of its booster - GIF

[Altair]

Starship stacked on top of its booster timelapse.




Previously:

SpaceX Raptor engines - photo
SpaceX Starship prototype explodes on landing - GIF
SpaceX Starship on modular transporter - GIF
SpaceX Starship hoisted onto launch pad - GIF
SpaceX Falcon boosters landing - GIF

[schuylergrace]

Does it feel to any of the other old folks on here like we've come full circle in the space race with this? I remember the 1960s vision of space was us flying shiny, finned rockets, just like this to the moon and beyond and even landing them on their tails!

[Frank S]

Does it feel to any of the other old folks on here like we've come full circle in the space race with this? I remember the 1960s vision of space was us flying shiny, finned rockets, just like this to the moon and beyond and even landing them on their tails!

Do you mean like this one

A new chapter in space flight began in July 1950 with the launch of the first rocket from Cape Canaveral, Fla: the Bumper 2, an ambitious two-stage rocket program that topped a V-2 missile base with a Corporal rocket. The upper stage was able to reach then-record altitudes of almost 250 miles, higher than the International Space Station's orbit.

Launched under the direction of the General Electric Company, Bumper 2 was used primarily for testing rocket systems and for research on the upper atmosphere. The rockets carried small payloads that allowed them to measure attributes including air temperature and cosmic ray impacts. Seven years later, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik I and Sputnik II, the first satellites into Earth orbit.

[schuylergrace]

[QUOTE=Frank S;205379]Do you mean like this one


Well, that's an actual one, but the rockets that really intrigued me were the ones on the covers of sci-fi books and in magazine stories about the future. The best ones always had gleaming, aerodynamic bodies and landed tail-down. And the astronauts would descend from doors up multiple stories off the surface of the moon or planet via stairs or a winch and cable. I never really thought landing that way was a good idea, so I was astounded the first time I saw one of Elon's boosters come back to earth. And his new Starship looks just like a picture of the future from my "Big Book of Space."

[Frank S]

[QUOTE=schuylergrace;205381]

Do you mean like this one


Well, that's an actual one, but the rockets that really intrigued me were the ones on the covers of sci-fi books and in magazine stories about the future. The best ones always had gleaming, aerodynamic bodies and landed tail-down. And the astronauts would descend from doors up multiple stories off the surface of the moon or planet via stairs or a winch and cable. I never really thought landing that way was a good idea, so I was astounded the first time I saw one of Elon's boosters come back to earth. And his new Starship looks just like a picture of the future from my "Big Book of Space."

I know what you mean I grew up on sci fi. Still feel that many of the Science fiction writers had a better view point of how the world could be better served, and if allowed to advance accordingly there would be a lot less strife and conflicts.

[Hoosiersmoker]

Their use of drones during the assembly is a great example of technology past generations didn't have for this type of construction.