Starship Flight Failure Analysis IFT2

OK everyone! We hope you studied the failure modes and came up with what you think happened. This is our failure analysis. Let us know what you think and stay safe!

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[rayoflight]

This is the most cognisant and knowledgeable analysis of the failure of SpaceX IFT-2 test that I've seen in print and video.
It would be nice if the turbopumps had an overspeed prevention system which intervened in case of no-load - i.e. no propellent flow; but I doubt it can be done.
Thank you for the great video.
Greetings from the UK,
Anthony

[robertobruselas]

The analysis of the Second Flight Test is excellent. Your assertion that there are no further modifications necessary for the booster is reasonable. When hot-staging, it's recommended to only fire the Vacuum Raptor Engines. By doing this, the Booster and Starship can feel less stressed from the hot staging. Gives the Booster more time to stabilize the propellant flow. It's worth a try. Saving your unnecessary drastic changes. Unnecessary costs. Your site provides valuable expertise. I am a SpaceX enthusiast from Europe.

[PhilTParker]

Very thoughtful and thorough analysis. The suggestions were straightforward and made sense. I will be watching FT3 to see if Spacex takes those suggested steps after their own review. Fingers crossed for a perfect flight!

[peterjrhanley]

Small detail,
Ullage Gas is not “pumped in to pressurize the tank”… it’s a byproduct of propellant boil off.

It is overboarded by venting and use as cold gas thrust nozzles.

The vehicle and booster are pressurized by outside gas supply for structural reasons during transport and storage when ullage gas is not present.

Excellent content and analysis.

[rexprangnell]

Thankyou for your brilliant analysis, and we hope that SpaceX is able to come to the same conclusions, as I look toward future success for starship❤ respect

[MrGunderfly]

great analysis. it will be interesting to compare this to the ultimate spacex public debrief. these observations, do tie many of the observed happenings together. i wish more of the popular space news outlets did not dumb-down their content, what we need in the west these days is to smart-up content. never patronize, never talk down, never over simplify. give the listener something to figure out... something to learn, to follow up on. thank you for not dumbing down your content.

[Garth_Bowen]

Very well done Sir! A very clear, direct and concise analysis.

[jamesowens]

Excellent, detailed analysis. I agree that most of the problems can likely be solved by adjustments to the separation sequence. Looking forward to the next test!

[ruorick]

If I'm not mistaken, the booster briefly experienced negative velocity when Starship pushed off, most definitely causing lots of propellant slosh.

[rickrack]

MANY TILES, MOSTLY AT SEAMS, AND MAYBE AT COLDER FUEL TANK AREAS (DIFFERENTIAL EXPANSION) FELL OFF ON ASCENT.

[stevenkarels]

It would seem the two areas of concern are the Hot Staging event and the Booster flip. The Hot Staging event, I suggest, should be changed as follows: (1) after all but 3 engines have been slowly turned off, slowly decrease the three firing engines to 50% thrust; (2) Starship fires its 3 vacuum optimized engines to effect separation; and (3) after a few seconds, fire up the remaining 3 Starship engines. Booster flip: (1) after the staging event is complete - begin the booster angle change using the 3 gimbaled engines and the attitude control venting - do this slowly so the booster is always under positive acceleration and to minimize sloshing; (2) when pointed in the correct direction, increase thrust as required.

[SirDeadPuppy]

thanks for the video ! nice to see some one say something useful for once!

[aboucard]

9:49 If you look closely you can see the 3 center engines on the StarShip split apart and then come together.

[charlespoole]

Solid fuel rockets to accelerate the booster and settle the fuel before burning methane?

[philoso]

Sounds like we didn’t have enough fixture mounted test runs.

[camaycama]

TSA you simply 100% rocks. Hey, literally, I hope Musk's team are aware of this. I guess so.

[theelephantintheroom]

It baffles me that people think a failed landing is a failed launch, like, SpaceX is the only rocket company actually trying to land their rockets - if we measure success on that then every rocket in history besides Falcon 9's 1st stage has been a failure.

[carlbrown]

Its better it failed before orbit. In orbit the shrapnel would be a hazard to other satellites. With the massive tile loss, it would have never survived reentry anyway.!!😥

[plainText]

Honestly I find myself disagreeing with your analysis a lot.
The analysis of the booster isn't that bad, the main issue is just your claim about FTS.
There's no evidence the booster actually activated FTS. If SpaceX had gotten a signal informing them about automated FTS triggering (like they presumably did with the Ship) they wouldn't have differentiated between the booster "RUD" and the ship "FTS activation".

The ship is where things really get bad.
The fact that there are minutes of flight between separation and failure really weakens your proposal of damage occurring during separation itself. The "out of controll spinning ship" is just a factually incorrect misrepresentation on your part. That's actually the remaining nose cone venting propellant from the header tanks/ downcomer AFTER FTS was triggered, not before.

It's a nice Idea to pin everything on the hotstaging procedure, but there's really nothing to support that.

Additional issues you did not mention:
>Heatshield tiles falling off
>Damage to Stage 0, including vertical tanks and QD (booster and ship) as well as fodag concrete around the outside of the steel pad
> The unexplained streak of dark exhaust coming from the booster right after liftoff

Additionally I'm not sure your proposed solution would even work. The almost empty booster will likely weigh significantly less than the fully fueled Ship. As such it will have much higher T/W, even with only three engines on minimum throttle. I doubt the Ship can actually seperate without pushing the booster back, causing some amount of negative acceleration.