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Real time reentry plasma field will never get old. Amazing

by s08148692

Seems like the booster landing burn did not light all the engines and so it crashed into the water.

by georgeburdell

Whoa the acceleration from the start surprised me. It’s huge and it just … zipped off the pad like a bullet (ok not real bullet but still).

by fsloth

Starship landed in the ocean intact and only slightly on fire!

by ACCount37

Its amazing to see this beast and think that all the firey stuff isn't the primary energy source (although totally necessary to pushing the mass out the back fast enough).

  The reason it’s very small is that almost all of the energy in hydrogen and oxygen is not stored in the chemical binding energy of these things going together.

  The vast majority of it is stored in just the rest mass energy of the protons and the neutrons, which chemical burning doesn’t affect at all.
https://www.dwarkesh.com/p/adam-brown-gr

[Edit note: Starship and Booster are methalox, yes. The physicist is talking generically, not about this launch specifically)

by adolph

Summary: almost, but not quite entirely successful.

Launch successful. Booster separation and boost back burn looked good. Booster failed to relight some of its engines and hit the water hard. Successfully deployed the 20 starlink satellites. Successfully reignited an engine in flight to prove potential for de-orbit burn on future flight. Re-entry looked good and less spicy that some previous attempts (subjective). Such a soft landing that the ship flopped into the water without exploding and floated for a good long while (possibly still floating for all I know). Got some great drone footage flying over the heat-shield.

So the ship itself is looking increasingly good (so far) but they still seem to be having some issues with the booster.

by staplung

Successful Raptor on-orbit relight demo! That should clear the next flight to go to orbit and deploy operational satellites! Big milestone for the program.

And the ship landing was so soft it didn't even explode! That's never happened before. And it's still connected to Starlink too. The ship's cameras are still working underwater! I wonder if they will be able to recover it intact?

We're getting some great views of the heat shield post-reentry. That's great data for the heat shield team. The heat shield is the biggest remaining question mark in the whole program. Reflight without heat shield refurbishment will be required for the whole architecture to work, and it's never been done before. None of the heat shields so far looked reusable without refurbishment, including this one.

Edit: Spashdown video https://x.com/SpaceX/status/2080804682918764619

by modeless

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  • Hacker News
  • You can also track the progress in text: https://www.cnn.com/2026/07/24/science/live-news/spacex-star...
    by andsoitis
  • Real time reentry plasma field will never get old. Amazing
    by s08148692
  • Seems like the booster landing burn did not light all the engines and so it crashed into the water.
    by georgeburdell
  • Whoa the acceleration from the start surprised me. It’s huge and it just … zipped off the pad like a bullet (ok not real bullet but still).
    by fsloth
  • Starship landed in the ocean intact and only slightly on fire!
    by ACCount37
  • Its amazing to see this beast and think that all the firey stuff isn't the primary energy source (although totally necessary to pushing the mass out the back fast enough).

      The reason it’s very small is that almost all of the energy in hydrogen and oxygen is not stored in the chemical binding energy of these things going together.

  The vast majority of it is stored in just the rest mass energy of the protons and the neutrons, which chemical burning doesn’t affect at all.
    https://www.dwarkesh.com/p/adam-brown-gr

    [Edit note: Starship and Booster are methalox, yes. The physicist is talking generically, not about this launch specifically)

    by adolph
  • Summary: almost, but not quite entirely successful.

    Launch successful. Booster separation and boost back burn looked good. Booster failed to relight some of its engines and hit the water hard. Successfully deployed the 20 starlink satellites. Successfully reignited an engine in flight to prove potential for de-orbit burn on future flight. Re-entry looked good and less spicy that some previous attempts (subjective). Such a soft landing that the ship flopped into the water without exploding and floated for a good long while (possibly still floating for all I know). Got some great drone footage flying over the heat-shield.

    So the ship itself is looking increasingly good (so far) but they still seem to be having some issues with the booster.

    by staplung
  • Successful Raptor on-orbit relight demo! That should clear the next flight to go to orbit and deploy operational satellites! Big milestone for the program.

    And the ship landing was so soft it didn't even explode! That's never happened before. And it's still connected to Starlink too. The ship's cameras are still working underwater! I wonder if they will be able to recover it intact?

    We're getting some great views of the heat shield post-reentry. That's great data for the heat shield team. The heat shield is the biggest remaining question mark in the whole program. Reflight without heat shield refurbishment will be required for the whole architecture to work, and it's never been done before. None of the heat shields so far looked reusable without refurbishment, including this one.

    Edit: Spashdown video https://x.com/SpaceX/status/2080804682918764619

    by modeless