BFR Developments

[Yazata]

The road to the launch area is (sorta) closed, with a sheriff's SUV with flashing lights stationed at the usual roadblock site and only allowing SpaceX cars through. The wooden barricade isn't up and there are still people at the pad. They were looking at the methane recondenser earlier and they had a scissor-lift up under the bottom of SN5. That was a few minutes ago, there's still a car at the pad next to SN5 and people are still looking at the methane recondenser.

Edit: Road is open again. Nothing much happened and the pad was never entirely cleared. These is some indication of some ambient temperature gas pressurization since some dents were seen to smooth out and returned later. If the plan today was to test the rocket engine fuel pumps as the road closure application said, then they will presumably have to try again tomorrow. Sunday is supposed to be the the start of the static fire campaign, perhaps only one static fire if no problems crop up. Then on to the hop next week or perhaps the week after.

[Yazata]

Road closures canceled for today and tomorrow. Still on for Monday and Tuesday. Now expected that this will just be tests of the fuel pumps. A static fire will probably follow closely, but unclear exactly when. Next week sometime. They really want to hop this one, but if that happens it will most likely be week after next.

[C C]

Road closures canceled for today and tomorrow. Still on for Monday and Tuesday. Now expected that this will just be tests of the fuel pumps. A static fire will probably follow closely, but unclear exactly when. Next week sometime. They really want to hop this one, but if that happens it will most likely be week after next.

I've lost track of how many times "Wolf!" has been cried or when some type of wolf actually last made an appearance. Has it really been almost a year (late August) since a "hop" occurred at Boca Chica?

[Yazata]

Road closures canceled for today and tomorrow. Still on for Monday and Tuesday. Now expected that this will just be tests of the fuel pumps. A static fire will probably follow closely, but unclear exactly when. Next week sometime. They really want to hop this one, but if that happens it will most likely be week after next.

I've lost track of how many times "Wolf!" has been cried or when some type of wolf actually last made an appearance. Has it really been almost a year (late August) since a "hop" occurred at Boca Chica?

I know. Frustrating isn't it? In this age of coronavirus I find myself kind of emotionally invested in happenings in Boca Chica. Like watching a (very) slow-motion science fiction movie.

Elon needs to learn how to build spaceships from Dr Zarkoff. (Maybe if Elon had finished his Stanford PhD...) Dr. Zarkoff never had these kind of delays. He just threw together a spaceship in his lab and told Flash Gordon and Dale Arden to take it and go fight Ming the Merciless on planet Mongo.

And Hoppy's still scaring the straights - its new dark nighttime persona made it look like Batman the other night. Here's disco-Hoppy:

(Photo by Carlos Nunez of CNunezImages)

[Image: EdP44mgXoAceBOg?format=jpg]

[Yazata]

Monday July 20: 11 AM local - Road is closed. Police roadblock is up. Pad not clear yet.

Edit: Pad is clear. There was a bit of drama getting that to happen. A police car was seen speeding down the road with its lights on, apparently somebody was spotted down near the launch site who needed to be chased off.

Edit 2: 12 noon local. Some people are saying that they see the ground support quick disconnects connecting and unconnecting. That's where the explosive SN4 failure was last time, so they appear to be carefully checking out their new arrangements. In other simultaneous news, Bluezilla, the Super Giant Crane, is busily raising prefabricated wall sections of the new High Bay which is rapidly getting taller.

Edit 3: 12:30 PM local. Mary reports that the grass is venting. (In Boca Chica absolutely everything vents.) There's come kind of gas vent that releases N2 or whatever it is down at ground level so that the vapor seems to be coming from the vegetation.

Lab Padre's stream

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/5QbM7Vsz3kg

[Yazata]

Elon's tweeted again!

Question: "Elon, what's the update on SN5?"

Elon: "Will attempt to fly later this week"

Will they try to fly it without a static fire?

Of course "later this week" could mean 'in a month' in Elon's Time Distortion Field. (Relativity!)

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1285617982970961921

Another soft roadblock in Boca Chica, erected very late (about 2 PM local). The road closure for today is supposed to expire around 5 PM. Unclear if the pad is totally clear, but the crowds of workers who usually work there aren't visible.

Edit: They Sheriffs took the roadblock down entirely and drove away. The pad doesn't appear to have ever been completely cleared and nothing visible happened with SN5. But... new road closures have been announced for all day Wed-Thurs-Friday, so lots more doing nothing is on tap.

The foundation of the Superheavy launch pad is coming along. Each of the corners of the hexagon are piles driven deep into the soft soil. Lots of rebar, concrete pouring to come soon. When the Superheavy launches, with 30 some Raptor engines, the ground will shake like an earthquake.

(Photo by RGV aerial photography who does weekly photographic flyovers.)

https://twitter.com/RGVaerialphotos/stat...0472837128

[Image: EdefG60WsAArnCd?format=jpg&name=small]

[Yazata]

Wednesday July 22 -- Sheriff's roadblock set up early. Still a soft block, SpaceX workers are still being allowed to drive down to the pad area. As far as I know, local residents haven't received the warning leaflets. Pad not cleared yet.

In other news, a new Raptor engine was delivered yesterday, as were three shiny new industrial welding robots. The NSF caption said "We welcome our new robot overlords!" The engineers seem to think that they always intended to go more towards industrial robots, but needed to try to build a few Starships by hand so that they would know precisely what kind of tasks the robots needed to perform.

Edit -- Multiple cars have left the pad. Locals have not received the warning leaflets, so no static fire today and certainly no hop. Perhaps a fueling and fuel pump test.

Edit 2 -- Pad clear.

Edit 3 -- Lots of vapor at the tank farm, some small venting from the top methane tank.

Edit 4 -- They appear to be detanking. I think that they were testing out the fueling to be used in the hop, fueled header tanks and gaseous pressure in the main tanks. So no visible frosting on the outside of the tanks, nothing very exciting. No spectacular explosions (which is a good thing.) On to the static fire and the flight!

[Yazata]

Today they were going over test results and a closure was scheduled for Friday, which was expected to be a static fire. But...

The Friday closure has been cancelled and SpacePadreIsle reports that testing is on hold until Monday because of strengthening Tropical Storm Hanna. This isn't likely to be a big threat and is aimed more at the Corpus Christi area, but it may or may not bring rain and bad weather to Boca over the weekend.

https://twitter.com/SpacePadreIsle/statu...0032917505

Edit: Tropical Storm Warning in effect. Tropical Storm Hanna was headed towards Corpus Christi, but now seems to be on a more westerly course and will cross the coast south of there. They also say that most of the rain is on the south side of the storm. From the National Weather Service forecast, it looks like spin-off thunderstorms may be the biggest threat. Lots of rain and maybe gusty winds and lightening coming.

https://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.ph...xsYNojYrrd

Right now, things are sunny, clear and hot, typical Boca weather.

Edit: They don't seem to be letting a little thing like a tropical storm warning get them down. New road closures have been announced for a static fire on Saturday July 25, with backup days on Sunday July 27 and Monday July 28. Presumably these are weather-permitting. (The request might have already been in the pipeline.) There are rumors that Elon's private jet has just landed at Brownsville airport, so they do seem to plan to do something as soon as weather permits. Presumably a static-fire and then a hop-flight a couple of days later. Next week sometime.

https://www.cameroncounty.us/spacex

I wonder where Elon stays when he's in town. He's not your normal billionaire, so maybe he doesn't require luxury accommodations. (He's more like a nerd with LOTS of money to play with.) Maybe he stays in one of the several modest houses that SpaceX bought in Boca Chica village.

Edit 2: Weather reports say that Hanna might strengthen into a weak cat. 1 hurricane as it comes ashore. But that's projected to be more up by Kingsville.

[Image: 221748_5day_cone_no_line_and_wind.png]

[Yazata]

They distributed the explosion warning notices in Boca last night, and the Sheriffs set up their road block this morning about 8 AM local.

The pad was never totally cleared, and the Sheriffs took down their road block about 9:15 local.

Hanna is now a hurricane. Seems to be gradually turning south. See map above which updates automatically.

So the current indication is that the static fire has been scrubbed today due to worsening weather.

Edit: The Sheriffs appear to have put their roadblock back up. Last vehicles seem to be leaving the pad. Still not 100% clear what is happening.

Edit 2: The Sheriff's roadblock is gone again. Looks like they weren't sure what they are going to do either.

Edit 3: Definitely looks like todays's static fire is postponed due to worsening weather. Current live-cam conditions in Boca are some overcast, windy but not excessively (Boca is always windy), and still no rain. But outer rain bands of Hurricane Hanna are just offshore. Conditions expected to deteriorate.

Right now, the National Hurricane Center predicts less than 10% chance of hurricane force winds in Boca, but more than 50% chance of tropical storm force winds. Rain is expected to be heavy. Storm surge probably won't be (SpaceX facilities are out in the tidal marsh), since the storm will pass north of Boca and rotates counterclockwise, so the winds in Boca will probably be from the west.

Edit 4: It looks to me like the biggest threat in Boca is flash flooding. The National Weather Service calls the flooding danger "extreme" in the Rio Grande Valley area. LabPadre's little weather station next to the launch area shows 26 mph wind sustained with 35 mph gusts. Still zero rain in that location. There's water visible on Lab's live-cam next to the road, which is unusual since it's not high tide. Apparently due to Gulf of Mexico surge.

Edit 5: It's started raining in Boca Chica.

Edit 6: Interesting that some kind of roadblock is back up. It's a white pickup and a regular white sedan parked diagonally across both lanes of the 2-lane road. They don't appear to be Sheriff's vehicles. I'm guessing (pure speculation) that it might be SpaceX security (they drive white Teslas) and maybe the Sheriffs requested the roadblock to keep residents off the beach during the storm. A black Tesla Model 3 just drove past the roadblock and went down the road to the launch site at high speed rooster-tailing rain water. It turned into the launch area, but only remained there for a couple of minutes and then drove back at a slower rate of speed. Again it went by the roadblock without stopping and turned right on the road to Boca Chica village. (Did Elon forget his cell-phone?) LabPadre's live-cam shows rain is heavier and wind is howling.

[Image: Edy7XtYWAAEZgg6?format=jpg]

[C C]

^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^
If SpaceX has vulnerabilities to this kind of weather, better they find out now than after the whole arm is stuck into the noodling hole.