Is the FAA to blame for Starship delays?

Starship is getting closer and closer to its first orbital test flight but is the FAA solely the reason for the delays? Haygen breaks down the challenges SpaceX has been having preparing for this monumental flight.

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L2 Boca Chica (more clips and photos) from BC's very early days to today.

0:00 - Intro
0:23 - Booster 7
1:45 - Ship 24
3:36 - Ad
4:43 - GSE readiness
5:49 - Production Site Construction
6:12 - Future Vehicles
6:39 - Edome Test Tank
6:54 - Mystery Box
7:08 - Past Vehicles
7:35 - Conclusion

[kokomo]

I am inclined to think that, as far as booster and ship production, SpaceX has taken the opportunity of the delay to continue refining them. The same goes for the tower and other facilities.

Of course, I am wrong a lot of the time.

[ranchis]

Highly speculative, I personaly want to believe if FAA had let the original Enviromental statement stand, SpaceX would have gone ahead with launches even with suboptimal conditions, They never showed the slightest fear of failure with past launches so there is no reason to believe they would willingly "choose" to wait until every detail of stage 0 was perfect, and wait for raptor 2 development. These developments would have eventually happened but launch attempts equal hard data and without the data, booster 7 and ship 24 are still just their best guess instead of an iteration based on solid data

[xlUIblisUlx]

I think you're largely ignoring the explanatory power of Parkinson's Law here: The work will expand to fill the time allotted. If you reverse the causality, the various regulatory delays that have prevented SpaceX from conducting validation testing involving launches from Boca Chica can themselves be the explanation for SpaceX's alternative focus on redesigning Raptor, building out a sophisticated GSE operation, reimagining a more mass-efficient landing procedure with a catch-tower, etc. These tasks obviously delay the launch of "Starship 2" - a system that now requires a sophisticated Stage 0 platform to start the booster engines, and a catch tower to catch the vehicles - but would not necessarily have delayed "Starship 1", an MVP with landing legs, and more complex engines that would have been more difficult to manufacture.

If we imagine an alternate universe, with no regulatory delays, SpaceX may instead have been more interested in launching an "orbital MVP" to test aspects of re-entry/tiles, refueling, etc. during this period, and maybe they would have done this whole "redesign of Raptor" and "overbuild the GSE" at a later date, to improve the economic viability of the program and reduce the complexity of the vehicle and engine manufacturing over the longer run.

The FAA probably *did* delay SpaceX from conducting *an* orbital test, in my mind, but just of a vastly different vehicle. As a result of the delays, SpaceX may now be able to iterate and launch their orbital test articles more quickly, and "cheaply" (in a per-unit sense), as they've put a bunch of these capital and design improvements up-front of this orbital testing. They may have preferred to do some of this stuff *simultaneously*, and it sure has been boring to watch this version of reality, but regulators gonna regulate.

[stevebowen]

@HaygenWarren @NASASpaceflight I don't think blame is the right word. Also, this video misses the obvious fact that if approval had come in November/December they may have proceeded with testing and launch of 4/20. But because they knew they couldn't launch they shifted focus to developing raptor 2 components. But to me, it's quite likely that if they had a green light 6 months ago they would have pressed forward with raptor 1 in order to get Starlink 2 to orbit asap. But a thorough consultation isn't something we should be trying to blame the FAA for. Doing this part properly now will prevent a mountain of legal issues down the road. It just doesn't pay in the long run to rush this part.

[atemoc]

0:03 :
- Vehicle readiness
- Ground infrastructure readiness
- FAA approval and launch license

0:11 :
We have to point out that this is two weeks shorter than the usual 1-month delays, which is a very good sign

0:13 :
No

2:21 :
Yes, we DO know what happened, it is explained a few seconds later

2:38 :
This is not a thermal tile issue, if you bang with a hammer from the inside, of course tiles are going to drop off, they are not made to handle that

[suiethacks]

Let's not harp on the FAA's repeated schedule slip. Let's do remember that SpaceX can run at a sprint without barriers so the slowdown since last summer could have been less crippling if the FAA wasn't throwing red flags.

[jamesm.vanwinkle]

Sx adjusted work and prototypes to match the FAA so as to minimize impact. It is not fruitful to 'what if' as a result of Sx's opportunistic adaptation. If FAA has not delayed Sx significantly it is because Sx made design step changes within the FAA 'decision' period. BTW, FAA has one more hurdle after the 'Environmental Assessment.'

[DaTnkee]

Actually FAA prohibited even the engine testing, (limited in yearly six or so...) so yes. With these limitations the try and error approach is impossible.

[jasonstiletto]

The FAA has added external risk to the project which has resulted in changes to the sequence of SpaceX's actions. Ignoring how business deals with regulatory risks would make it seem like the energy sector doesn't like Nuclear, when they really just don't like the 20 year struggle to build a nuclear power plant through the barrage of red tape, regulations, and lawsuits.

[avsrule]

The video is highly speculative but obviously makes very good points. My belief is that they would have attempted to launch 4/20 if they were given the green light regardless of how far along the launch tower progress was; they would obviously have additional costs of installing hardware to the tower that is temporary but necessary for launch. They were well on their way with the 4/20 test campaign and we even saw several static fires.

With that being said, I also believe that the FAA delay is probably beneficial for the program, as it allowed them to fully complete the tower properly, and have a set of much more reliable engines. The engines installed on B4 were sketchy, to say the least, some of them very bare-bones test engines that were probably "good enough".

I also don't think that the delay is entirely intentional. I do believe that they had a lot to review (it's not every day that they need to approve a new spaceport). But their negligence in the month-to-month delay is what irritated myself the most. If you do not have the staff, or you know you don't have the time to get the review done in January, don't say that it'll be done in January. Simple as that. Give a date for March, or May, and then delay again if needed. It just became a joke after the 2nd/3rd delay, completely incompetent

[AKjohndoe]

Thank you for making these points. Stage 0 is so incredibly complex.

[sg]

as always very high quality content! looking forward to visit Starbase myself one day!

[neojted]

The FAA said the first delay was due to the high number of submissions by the public, but why the repeated delays after that?

[neojted]

SpaceX could have done a test sooner if the FAA had given approval sooner.

[kbayo]

I had never heard of Parkinson's Law but I agree with it. These delays are not the fault of spaceX. Clearly the FAA continually moving the date implies they had no idea how long this process would take. I do agree that without the FAA delays SpaceX probably would have at least tried to perform a launch but why not use this time to evolve the system when you clearly see improvements could be made. If only NASA had done that with the Columbia space shuttle boosters.

[damanfromtn]

Thanks for the good recap.

The audio was rather muffled. NSF should provide anyone on "coms" with a decent headset. I use a relatively cheap and light Plantronics USB headset with decent ear speakers and nice clear mic.

[chadwynia]

If the FAA had approved stuff in December, SpaceX probably would have froze what ever design they were on and possibly would have been ready to fly by Feb. But with the delays the have taken the opportunities to update tower and ship and probably test improvements for tower 2 in florida.

[miroslavmilan]

I generally agree with the premise of this video, but I also do believe that SpaceX would have sped up some steps that were on the critical path to orbit, and taken more risk to fly earlier, if they were able to. Their operation is very agile, and the moment it was clear that FAA approvals will take significantly longer, they have quickly pivoted towards new and better designs for both ship and engines. The only thing I’m not sure about is Methane storage, as that was clearly an unexpected setback for which they would not have had a quick solution.

[jfh]

What you call a "water deluge test" wasn't a deluge, it was a water mist test that the wind blew off to the side.

[direbearcoat]

These reports are fantastic! You guys do a great job! Keep up the great work!