The timing of the Flight 8 failure was similar to Flight 7 in January, which also featured several engine shutdowns and a loss of communications about eight and a half minutes after liftoff. However, SpaceX says the two failures had different causes.
“While the failure manifested at a similar point in the flight timeline as Starship’s seventh flight test, it is worth noting that the failures are distinctly different,” the company stated.
In the case of Flight 8, SpaceX said one of the center Raptor engines in Starship suffered a hardware failure, details of which the company did not disclose. That failure enabled “inadvertent propellant mixing and ignition” that caused the loss of the Raptor. Immediately thereafter, the other two center Raptor engines shut down, along with one of the three outer vacuum-optimized engines with larger nozzles. The vehicle then lost control authority.
The company said it made changes to the Raptors in the Starship upper stage, with “additional preload” on key joints and a new nitrogen purge system as well as improvements to the propellant drain system. A future version of Raptor in development will also have reliability improvements to address the problem seen on Flight 8.
On Flight 7 in January, SpaceX, said the vehicle suffered a harmonic response several times stronger than expected, creating additional stress on the vehicle’s propulsion system. That caused leaks that triggered a fire in the engine bay.
“The mitigations put in place after Starship’s seventh flight test to address harmonic response and flammability of the ship’s attic section worked as designed prior to the failure on Flight 8,” SpaceX said.
The guy who had a whole video about how Falcon 9 reusability would never work, and then quietly deleted it when proved badly wrong?
I’d stick with Destin if I were you …
I’ve been following him closely, the Internet never forgets. What video did he delete?
I’m asking you. If you’re a follower of his, I suggest you ask him to reupload any deleted videos to a second channel, for the sake of transparency.
This would have been a long time ago, obviously. Reusability is widely accepted these days.
If it’s true he deleted a video he’s obviously not going to reUpload.
You made a claim, the burden of proof is on you
You could at least find out what his response might be. If he outright lies, someone might come forward and ‘testify’ to that fact.
No, I asked a question.
I’m increasingly confident that Thunderfoot is indeed the guy about whom I’ve heard that allegation, but since I don’t have proof, it has to remain as a question
You’re asking me to pop a message to someone with over a million subscribers, and ask him what I think is a stupid question.
I’ve been following him closely for years, and he doesn’t release many videos, I don’t remember the video you’re talking about.
You can check the way back machine or Internet archives.
Where do you get the information from that he deleted videos?
Well here’s one example of the accusation (“deleted videos where he said spacex would never be able to re-fly a 1st stage”). Two replies seem to endorse it (e.g. “I recall him saying something like that”) and another seems to be fairly familiar with his output and to endorse the general point (“later tried to delete and cover up”). One of the replies links to a different video, which I haven’t looked at.
Note that the first ever booster re-use was around March 2017 so we’re probably talking about a deletion that happened no later than April 2017. And I’d expect he’d not be so stupid as to wait that long; he’d have probably deleted any such videos as soon as SpaceX announced that they’d found a willing customer (and insurance company), at the latest. So probably by late 2016 or early 2017.
Other stuff I just found …
Seems he had some argument with another unreliable You Tube ‘personality’ called Sargon who made a response video back in May 2017. That video is unavailable now but apparently it was still available in 2022 and convinced one person who had until then been unconvinced, that Thunder Foot “apparently just made up shit about someone which was completely false”.
I’ve just looked at one of his more recent “BUSTED!!” videos (July 2021, about Starlink) and I didn’t notice any outright falsehoods, so perhaps he’s being more circumspect these days. Also, he hasn’t deleted that one, even though it’s pretty embarrassing for him. So credit where it’s due.
That said, the simplest example I’ve come across of an apparently uncorrected falsehood from him is also from 2021: https://x.com/thunderf00t/status/1364020482572492801 It’s hardly a big deal, but he clearly knew that his followers believed the claim to be false, so it seems that at best he was lazy in not bothering to go back and read the 3 replies that proved they were correct.
Some general “debunkings” of more of his SpaceX claims:
https://old.reddit.com/r/SpaceXLounge/comments/lrhwxq/i_fact_checked_thunderf00ts_spacex_busted_part_1/
https://old.reddit.com/r/thunderf00t/comments/lthowt/some_fundamental_errors_in_thunderf00ts_spacex/ and https://old.reddit.com/r/thunderf00t/comments/lu6evm/a_more_casual_fact_check_on_thunderf00ts_spacex/
https://x.com/kedarus/status/1398785312567054336