i know they got the data they needed/wanted but can you really call it a success with that ending?
on a side note: how much money do they lose whenever they have a crash landing like that?
on a side note: how much money do they lose whenever they have a crash landing like that?
As a mere spectator, I'll add they achieved ALL my additional personal objectives, including: end-to-end live video/audio transmission from multiple onboard and ground tracking cameras, conveniently streamed in the late afternoon for free, near-instant pre and post-test insights direct from Elon via Twitter, AND a perfectly-framed SPECTACULAR live explosion in HD to cap it all off. From my (somewhat self-centered) perspective, how could it have been any more successful?
As for your "losing money" question, I'm not sure that's much of a factor with SN8 because it was a test article not expected to probably survive. It didn't even have final or complete flight systems. If it had remained more intact after landing, perhaps they could have reused some raw materials eventually for future test articles but that also requires extensive inspection to re-validate, disassemble and integrate - all of which would consume scarce schedule time, assembly space and the limited time of skilled personnel able to build final Starships. IHMO, SpaceX wisely prioritizes speed and learning over testing costs or PR optics.
The biggest unexpected cost may just be the "cleanup on aisle SN8" but they probably didn't expect SN8 would reach the landing pad as on-target as it did and may have budgeted even more time/money for clean-up than they'll need since it was pretty dang tidy for a RUD. I guess an over-water loss might be a bit faster/cheaper to reset but then they would have lost higher priority objectives and we wouldn't have had such a SWEET front-row ticket to the finale :-).
The main thing, and that is why it was a success, was the in-flight control, especially on the descent and before the landing. Only real loss was 3 engines they might have reused otherwise. But as the Starships themselves are extremely cheap to build - the next one is already mostly finished - it was basically considered expendable for the test.
Beyond understanding and fixing the fuel pressure issue, they just can proceed with their testing plans as scheduled.
> Goals are to test 3 engine ascent, body flaps, transition from main to header tanks & landing flip.
Considering they achieved all their goals, I would say it was a success.
During prototyping there's only one type of test that isn't a success: a test that fails for a previously known reason (e.g. repeating a known mistake or some external factor like earthquakes, flooding or weather) and that you learned nothing from.
"Goals are to test 3 engine ascent, body flaps, transition from main to header tanks & landing flip."
So the SpaceX team went four for four...
Just like bare scientific method of trial and error.
This test on the other hand was a test with a low change of complete success and thus failure was an expected and acceptable - but not the intended - outcome.