Re: SpaceX Falcon Ready to Go - Again.

In article <1133977532.274547.114440@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Tom Cuddihy
says...
>
>
>Ed Kyle wrote:

>> BTW, there has been a lot of talk about how wonderful
>> a place Kwaj is for launching rockets. The truth is that
>> there are so many occupied islands in the region to the
>> east that launch azimuths are suprisingly limited.
>> Azimuths from 55 degrees to 110 degrees present
>> downrange problems, for example.


>How much of a problem is that really though? If a 1 mi^2 island 100
>miles to the northwest is downrange, the chances that any kind of
>launch would actually hit there are miniscule. At Vandenburg, on the
>other hand, if a rocket launched east came down and missed Lompoc, it
>could still hit Bakersfield or maybe some dude's ski lodge at Bear
>Mountain or whatever (I don't actually know the geogrpahy that well out
>there). I think there's a statistical difference there between a 1 in a
>million chance of landing on some tiny podunk island and a 1/1 chance
>of landing SOMEWHERE in California if it goes down.

There is essentially a 0/1 chance of a rocket launched out of Vandenberg
landing anywhere in California, on account of California is the land mass
north and east of Vandenberg and rockets launched from Vandenberg only
ever fly south, where California isn't. And they don't even fly south
if there's a strong wind out of the west to potentially blow debris
towards land.

And the "hey, the rocket *almost* certainly won't crash on your piddly
little island!" technique would work a lot better if those islands weren't
in many cases the sovereign territory of nations not known as the United
States of America. Also, Hawaii owns two senators.


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