SpaceX Super Heavy Doubles the Power of the Saturn V

[Elderberry]

Next Big Future  June 5, 2021 by Brian Wang

https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2021/06/spacex-super-heavy-doubles-the-power-of-the-saturn-v.html

The SpaceX Super Heavy booster that will fly to orbit should be completed within weeks. This first booster will have 29 Raptor engines and each engine will have 225 tons of thrust. The regular Super Heavy boosters will have 32 Raptor engines for 7200 tons of thrust. The Saturn V that flew men to the moon had 3580 tons of thrust.

Kendall Dirks, @Kendall_Dirks on twitter, has renderings of the SpaceX Super Heavy starship standing on the sea launch platforms that SpaceX is making from oil platforms.




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aF-6Bdvn0mM&t=154s

[rustynail]

Like to be near the launch.  I am thinking the earth will shake like a thousand funny car run.

[Elderberry]

Like to be near the launch.  I am thinking the earth will shake like a thousand funny car run.

I am sure going to try and watch a launch. Boca Chica or Padre Island is only a 6 hr drive for me.

[Joe Wooten]

I wonder how long it will be before the envirowhackos revive the charge they leveled against Saturn 5 launches by claiming the upper stages burned a huge hole in the ozone layer and spewed pollution all over the globe. I think there were a couple of lawsuits over this.

[Elderberry]

SpaceX's Falcon 9 Rocket Burned a 560-Mile Hole in the Atmosphere

Mental Floss  BY Michele Debczak March 27, 2018

https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/537800/spacexs-falcon-9-rocket-burned-560-mile-hole-atmosphere

On August 24, 2017, Elon Musk's aerospace company SpaceX launched and landed one of its Falcon 9 rockets. While it's not the most powerful rocket in SpaceX's arsenal, the shockwaves from the trip were strong enough to tear a 560-mile-wide hole through a layer of the atmosphere, Fortune reports.

The rupture occurred in the ionosphere between 50 and 620 miles above Earth. Most rockets are able to make it past this layer without disturbing it by curving their trajectory. When a rocket flies almost parallel to the ground, it burns less rocket fuel fighting the force of gravity, leaving more to lift it and its payload past Earth's atmosphere.

For Falcon 9, this wasn't necessary: Its only cargo was an Earth observation satellite for Taiwan’s National Space Organization that weighed about 1050 pounds. This relatively light burden allowed the rocket to follow a nearly vertical route into orbit. This had an unintended consequence: As the Falcon 9's booster and second stage fired, it radiated circular shockwaves that ate through the ionosphere, leaving an opening that remained for nearly three hours.