SN9 prepares for liftoff
On December 9, SpaceX made history after launching SN8 on the first-ever high-altitude Starship flight to 41,000 ft (12.5 km). The purpose of the flight was to test an entirely new way to land a fully-reusable rocket with a unique belly-flop and landing flip maneuver. The launch and physical maneuvers functioned almost flawlessly but, as Elon stated on Twitter, “Low pressure in the fuel header tank led to the hard landing.” Though the crowds of SpaceX employees and enthusiasts cheered in jubilation over the massive success of the test flight, the vehicle was ultimately lost in a landing explosion.
Now, just one month after SN8’s flight, SpaceX is preparing to launch SN9. Using the data they gathered during SN8’s flight, SpaceX is hoping that SN9 results in a successful test and landing.
The first rully-stacked Starship rolls out to the pad
SN8 was rolled out to the pad in pieces, then fully stacked while sitting on the launchpad. But, just days after the SN8 flight, SpaceX attempted to roll out a fully-stacked Starship for the first time. That first attempt resulted in what appears to be minor damage to SN9, after it fell over inside the high-bay. The SpaceX crew didn’t flinch—getting right back to work, they made the necessary fixes and moved on to rolling out a fully-stacked Starship for the very first time.
We were in Boca Chica to capture this historic moment, as the large crew of workers carefully and successfully delivered SN9 from the high bay and down the road to the launch stand. The videos we captured pay tribute to the very hard work of the SpaceX employees who rotate through 24/7 shifts to make this rocket development progress at exponential speeds.
Starship SN9 in Virtual Reality
In addition to capturing this moment in all its 4k glory with our cinema cameras, we also used our stereoscopic 180 cameras to better translate the grandeur of Starship. All of our Patreon supporters get exclusive access to a downloadable VR file so they can experience this in full immersion with their VR headsets (such as Occulus Quests). But, we’ve also made the YouTube video available to all.
Watch the SN9 launch life with us
Once again, we will team up with the Everyday Astronaut and SPadre teams to live-stream the event. When the time comes, we will embed the Everyday Astronaut YouTube stream here. We also encourage you to subscribe to the YouTube channel and click the bell to receive a notification as soon as we go live!
Starship SN9 static fire this afternoon 🔥
— SPadre (@SpacePadreIsle) January 6, 2021
12.5k flight Saturday 🚀 pic.twitter.com/lGKwXyQd5v
HOP ALERT: If a static fire test happens on Wednesday for SN9, we could potentially see a hop as early as Friday. Weather for that day looks fine. https://t.co/feKOStNpd7
— Eric Berger (@SciGuySpace) January 5, 2021
