i’m going to fucking explode
the spacex all-private inspiration4 mission (which is being run as a reality tv show) is using apple watches for its biometrics. they’re flying in a space capsule with all the equipment and controls stripped out to make it look smooth and pretty, in spacesuits designed by a marvel costume designer instead of engineers, wearing fucking apple watches for biometrics
the ship’s built like a fucking tesla and it uses a fucking touchscreen for controls
op’s not the only thing that’s going to explode
Okay I sent an ask to my mutual about this because we’re both Aerospace Engineering students, myself specializing in Astronautics, but y'know what fuck it I got nothing better to do and I just wanna go over some of SpaceX’s…design choices.
So completely ignoring the whole issue with privatizing space travel and Night Sky Clutter with the whole OneWeb/Starlink issue, SpaceX makes very questionable and sometimes outright idiotic design choices. With the Dragon Capsule alone, the decision to remove virtually any form of manual control and to have all of your inputs be done via touchscreen is just…not smart. At all. The suits they wear are purely designed for aesthetic and lack any form of personal protection and seemingly lack any form of life support or survival equipment. For comparison, the LES and ACES suits all include some form of limited life support in the event that your mode of transportation has a critical failure while also being pressure suits or at the very least partial-pressure suits and carry multiple survival aspects such as parachutes, inflatable life rafts, and other tools to help an astronaut survive and be recovered from emergency landing sites that will usually be in the wilderness. The SpaceX suits, well, we don’t KNOW what’s in the suit because Musky boy won’t tell us. It’s privatized, what do you expect, they care more about keeping their tech to themselves than safety or transparency. It’s claimed to survive a “vacuum chamber” just fine but no actual test results have been shown. Musk himself claimed that the suits are an improvement from the old LES and it’s replacement the ACES suits because it’s sleeker and with a cool white design. Now lemme say something on this, there is a fucking reason that the old suits are bulky and orange. Why? Because they’re pressure suits with survival equipment and life support built in. They’re not sleek because how the fuck are you gonna fit air bladders, a parachute, survival kits, aid kits, and air systems on a sleek suit? That’s why the old suits were bulky because they worried about the SAFETY of the wearer not how fucking cool they look. Also the orange? Y'know why they’re orange? So we can fucking seem them if they end up stranded in the ocean or wilderness after an emergency landing. In fact, one veteran astronaut who flew on missions STS-129 and STS-135 compared the suits to the old Soviet Sokol suits. Now I don’t know how many of you know about Sokol suits, but these are basically backup “everything has gone to shit” suits. However even the Sokol suit contains some form of life support which is more than can confidently be said about the SpaceX suits.
And beyond just this photo we also have Elon insisting that satellite casings and thermal control systems be painted BLACK because it makes them look cooler but here’s the thing, the reason satellites typically have white, beige, or gaudy ass chrome foil covering is because the sun is a hot motherfucker and electronics, and well electronics my friends, don’t like heat. Guess what black does? It absorbs heat, well technically visible light but whatever. So we put light colors and reflective covering on satellites and components designed for space so they can reflect heat and try to keep them cool. SpaceX on the other hand has to include more intense cooling measures because their idiot leader follows the rule of cool which ironically makes things less cool. Oh and there’s also the whole issue with the first rocket blowing up due to fuel sloshing which, I should add, is the first thing you learn not to do and how to AVOID in any form of aerospace engineering so, y'know, the fact that their rocket suffered from that is, well, telling.
Anyway this got a lot longer than I intended but fuck it man and fuck Elon, and fuck SpaceX for thinking Star Trek aesthetics are more important than, idk, the entire collective knowledge we’ve gained about space travel and flight safety.
Look, there are a lot of reasons to hate elon musk, but a lot of this info is not true.
The suits work in tandem with the seats of the dragon capsule - so no, by itself the suit won’t do much but once it’s plugged into the rest of its machinery, its a regular spacesuit. Think about that big backpack nasa astronauts wear. Thats in the chair now. That’s the main difference. And if we’re upset the suits aren’t orange, make sure you yell at nasa too bc their suits are white. I can see why having bright suits would be important, but also its something that’s long since been changed by non-private organizations.
The starlink sats have been painted black to deal with the overcrowding issue. They will reflect less light so as not to fuck up telescopes and shit here on earth. (I think the whole starlink thing is a goddam mess, but lets share correct info about it) The first batches sent up were not painted. Then they tried several types of paint to see what would make the sats not super reflective but also not cook. There’s tension between folks who say they cant go darker and folks who say they can. This was discussed at the most recent Planetary Society’s PlanetFest conference and even professional scientists got heated over it in the conference calls. Its controversial, but not due to “cool paint” or whatever. It’s a scientific debate on the application of light absorbing materials and how space affects them.
Spacex science isnt that stupidly bad, but you know what is? Their POLITICS
There is currently an environmental assessment going on for the Boca Chica launch site. It is open for public comment. Read the assessment and tell the EPA what you think.
I’m saying all this because as space tech develops, we need to make sure we mobilize against the right things. Incorrect info made to make people go “hurr durr spacex dumb” is dangerous because it makes it seem like they’re not *really* a threat to the democratic use of space - “surely they’ll fall apart, they’re so dumb”. Do not get complacent. Stay informed and stay on top of things we CAN do to help shape this bizarre path forward.
Reusable rockets will advance science. Launching those rockets in places that will harm wildlife and other things is bad. Participate and be vocal about the real problems so we can advance science safely.
Okay I just wanna respond that upon further research it is a fact that the Starlink satellites we’re painted black to try and counteract the night sky clutter they caused, however Elon still commented that he liked them better anyway cause the black makes them look cool and I feel like aesthetic shouldn’t have a place in this field, at least not with our current technology where we can’t afford to sacrifice function. But regardless it is true that they were blackened to lower ground based astronomy impact so I will give them that.
But the suits are still an issue. The point of the ACES suits, which is NASAs suits, is that they can survive on their own. The fact that the SpaceX suits can only perform the same function of the ACES suits while plugged into the seat is a failure as it disregards the point of the suit which is that it can keep the astronaut safe in the event that the vehicle they are in fails and if the suit has to be connected to them outside the ship then it has failed again as it has thus become even bulkier and less maneuverable than the “bulky” suits they aimed to replace. Also, NASAs launch and entry suits ARE still orange. The white suits NASA uses are entirely for space walks and EVA, the orange suits are used for travel to and from space for the reason I previously stated. The issue here is that SpaceX uses the white suit for the same activity NASA uses orange suits for.
In the end of the day, SpaceX is wildly incompetent when compared to what knowledge is already known. SpaceX did have a rocket fail due to fuel sloshing which is the first thing any aerospace engineer learns to avoid, they did remove manual control interfaces in favor of touchscreen, and they did disregard basic safety concepts for aesthetic and a faux-advanced mindset. There’s also a downside to hiding all of the internal mechanisms and wiring because that doesn’t allow for in flight maintenance or repair which is something that has to very much be considered for a space vehicle.
It sucks because on one hand I like that SpaceX, to a degree, is pushing space technology forward and has reignited a lot of national interest in space programs but on the other hand I despise that they’re doing it in the way they are.
Reblogging with link to the FAA (not EPA, my bad) assessment page now that I’m not typing in my car from a drive thru lol
https://www.faa.gov/newsroom/faa-invites-public-comment-draft-environmental-review-spacex-starshipsuper-heavy-program
Also, I’m sorry for coming off hella salty in my response, and thank you for the nasa suit info!
Big agree that I hate the way spacex is going about all this shit. I’m including a link to a neat interview Casey Drier from the Planetary Society did with Linda Billings about space advocacy communication; they touch on the colonial aspects of contemporary space exploration and I think the info is really useful for interpreting a lot of the spacex bullshit!
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/planetary-radio-space-exploration-astronomy-and-science/id91689834?i=1000534229854
Show Planetary Radio: Space Exploration, Astronomy and Science, Ep Space Policy Edition: The cultural rituals of space advocacy, with Linda
Hey, thanks for the links! And it's all good, sorry if I came off as a bit hostile. I've loved space since I was little kid and it's part of the reason I'm studying astronautical engineering and why I'm such an advocate for space exploration. So I get a little heated watching SpaceX privatize and capitalize humanity's progress beyond Earth and ignore what people have learned before them in favor of sleek designs and Star Trek aesthetics.
Seriously tho, thanks for the links I'll definitely reading/listening to this stuff during my off time!
