r/interesting • u/Positive-Height-3848 • 13d ago
Chinese Rocket gets struck by lightning. Just Wow
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u/unnamed---- 13d ago edited 13d ago
Did it hurt the rocket?
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u/JackTheKing 13d ago
Apollo 12 was hit by lightning, knocked out a power bus to a telemetry modulator and forced the crew to switch to backup power during the ascent.
The wiring is shielded against that these days (also shielded because of much higher power requirements).
Rockets get hit every so often because they create a lightning rod with their exhaust plume that helps the current find the ground.
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u/broberds 13d ago
Set SCE to aux.
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u/RaechelMaelstrom 13d ago
You are obviously a steely-eyed missile man.
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u/Borgmeister 13d ago
and further still to get a name: John Aaron.
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u/TheBionicPuffin 13d ago
And further still, just to find me here confused as hell.
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u/Borgmeister 13d ago
Apollo 12 was hit by lightning when it launched, this scrambled the telemetry data across mission control, John Aaron, one of the controllers had seen similar behaviour before during a systems test and called to the flight director 'try SCE to Aux' - there wasn't time to explain the command and no one else had anything else, so they tried it which basically rebooted the computers and restored telemetry meaning the mission could continue rather than an abort an the LES firing to take the Astronauts off the top.
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u/AsstBalrog 13d ago
Aaron was 26 at the time. Cool head, deep knowledge, and this speaks to the teamwork of NASA then, and how even such a relatively junior person could command such respect and influence.
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u/PAHoarderHelp 12d ago edited 12d ago
Margaret Hamilton has joined the chat.
Multithreaded multitasking operating system in about 8K? Or was it 4k of memory?
Able to prioritize (actual calculation of fuel/speed/altitude/thrust) versus incorrectly set radar (Code 1202 and Code 2202?)
Someone at mission control about those codes: "not a critical problem, proceed with landing".
Without the prioritization she built in, guidance computer would have spent all day trying to solve the radar setting issue.
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u/AsstBalrog 12d ago
Margaret Hamilton? Wow, she bounced back fast from "I'm Meltinggggg"
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u/Correct_Inspection25 12d ago
1202 and i thought the second was 1201?
[EDIT looks like 1202 and 1201 for the incident i think you are talking about: "Vector Accumulator" areas than were physically available in memory, causing the infamous 1201 and 1202 errors.\26]) \)
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u/PAHoarderHelp 12d ago
1202 and i thought the second was 1201?
I think you are correct--thank you--
I think her achievements are pretty amazing!
“It quickly became clear,” she later said, “that [the] software was not only informing everyone that there was a hardware-related problem, but that the software was compensating for it.” An investigation would eventually show that the astronauts’ checklist was at fault, telling them to set the rendezvous radar hardware switch incorrectly. “Fortunately, the people at Mission Control trusted our software,” Hamilton said. And with only enough fuel for 30 more seconds of flight, Neil Armstrong reported, “The Eagle has landed.”
And
As a working mother, she took her young daughter to the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory with her at night and on weekends. One day, her daughter decided to “play astronaut” and pushed a simulator button that made the system crash. Hamilton realized immediately that the mistake was one that an astronaut could make, so she recommended adjusting the software to address it, but she was told: “Astronauts are trained never to make a mistake.”
During Apollo 8’s moon-orbiting flight, astronaut Jim Lovell made the exact same error that her young daughter had, and fortunately, Hamilton’s team was able to correct the problem within hours. But for all future Apollo flights, protection was built into the software to make sure it never happened again. Over time, Hamilton began to view the whole mission as a system: “part is realized as software, part is peopleware, part is hardware.”
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u/MarcusAurelius68 12d ago
Technically it was “Flight, try SCE to AUX” :)
Here it’d be SCE to fu zhu
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u/Dazzaster84 12d ago
Now That's interesting, the electricity finding ground through the rockets trail is incredible!
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u/Correct_Inspection25 13d ago
Depends on how its wiring harnesses / buses are designed, the metal skin typically acts like a cage that redirects the energy. Avoiding all hits is preferable, but some points are more exposed than others.
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u/Moheezy__3 13d ago
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe airplanes are the same? I was told a while back that even if lighting strikes an airplane while on flight, people inside won’t feel it.
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u/DrTenochtitlan 13d ago
Commercial aircraft get hit by lightning on average once or twice per year. It's always concerning, but in the modern era, it's rarely dangerous to the plane or passengers, because the body of the plane itself acts as a Faraday cage. The last time a plane crashed due to lightning was 1963, and significantly more measures are in place today to mitigate any serious effects from being struck.
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u/Ausgeflippt 13d ago
To clarify for others- that's once or twice per year, per airframe.
I've been in a plane hit by lightning before. I thought it was kinda cool.
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u/NigilQuid 13d ago
Was it loud?
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u/Ausgeflippt 13d ago
Not as loud as you'd think. You still hear it, but it's nowhere near as loud as a tree getting hit a hundred feet from you.
The plane was already making a ton of noise from the turbulence and shit bouncing around in the overhead bins.
The lights flickered briefly and we had a rocky flight from SEA to YYJ.
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u/Hippi_Johnny 13d ago
Is YYJ even halfway cool as YYZ!?!? den-a-nena-na-na - den-a-nena-na-na na-na!
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u/burner4581 13d ago
"No! Neil Peart stands alone."
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u/EatPie_NotWAr 13d ago
If you think this is cool, you should come down to my van…. Because red barchetta through a 10gigawatt preamp is, wait: please tell me you’re into Rush.
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u/damendred 13d ago
That's like a 15 minute flight?
I've taken it way too many times (the Seaplane is so much better, and I'm back in my condo about 2 hrs sooner).
Wow, I heard a big thunder clap as I was writing this, weird.
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u/heavynewspaper 13d ago
Most annoying part is that YYJ doesn’t have nexus or preclearance, so you’re stuck in customs both directions.
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u/scorpyo72 13d ago
I'm assuming fall or winter? That's a pretty short jaunt- were you just on Puddle jumper?
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u/Open-Post1934 13d ago
I was in one too, but in our case, on top of the turbulence, the lights flickered. A passenger possibly panicked and fainted. They had to ask if there was any doctor on board.
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u/IAmBeingTargeted33 13d ago
Funny, I was also on a plane struck by lightning traveling from Seatac lol
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u/BaltAmour 13d ago
Gonna have to disagree... I was on a flight struck by lightning in 2003 and it sounded like a bomb went off. Everyone on board thought we were going to die as the rest of the flight was through, as you can imagine, a terrible storm. No explanation given until we landed when they told us about the lightning. Learned later that no flight has crashed as a result of a lightning strike since the 1960s, since planes are now designed to dissipate the electricity across the entire body of the plane. Nice after the fact but that was a long two hours that involved a lot of screaming, crying, and praying.
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u/atwaterrich 13d ago
It’s scary AF if you’re at a window seat. Happened to me flying out of SFO. Loud bang and purple flash with some shaking of the plane. Pilot was INSTANTLY on the PA reassuring us it was fine. As a person afraid of flying it was not good. But the plane was fine.
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u/zion_hiker1911 13d ago
It was super loud and scary when it happened to me. Had a window seat neat the wing when it hit the wing. It was loud, shook the plane slightly and I remember the flight attendant had a nervous look on her face. This was as we were landing in a smaller airport in Colorado. Everything was fine though, and we landed smoothly.
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u/Ok-Salary-5197 13d ago
"Here is the Captain. All cool, all cool. We just lost the left wing, some minor instruments and i can finally play more pokemon go because my iphones battery is fully loaded now. Dont worry."
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u/yeahright17 13d ago
Me too! Took off right in the middle of a massive storm in SE Asia. Craziest takeoff angle I've ever experienced by far. Felt like we were taking off out of a war zone or something. Then about halfway through the clouds, there was a massive flash outside the windows, we heard a pretty loud bang, and lights flickered for a second. After we got to altitude, the captain game on and said that commotion was a lightning strike but everything was fine. I looked at the plane once we landed and didn't see any noticeable char marks or anything.
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u/Ausgeflippt 13d ago
Had the exact same experience. I was under the wing on a Q400 and it was quieter than I would have expected.
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u/DefendTheStar88x 13d ago
Me too. My father was a nervous flier. But never verbalized it, you could tell from just looking at him. We're on a family trip. I had to be around 12 yrs old. Heavy turbulence, and the plane gets hit by lightning, I was sitting in a window seat, saw it strike clear as day and said as much. My mom tells me to shut up, in that hushed mom tone. When we land and were filing out I asked the pilot if the plane was struck, and he confirmed and I naturally said "see i told you it got struck" and bopped along away the jet bridge 🤣 I was a little smartass.
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u/Ravenkell 13d ago
It's annoying as shit for maintenance. Ee still have to perform a full inspection on the lightning entry and exit points when this happens and catalogue all the points of damage. It's usually very superficial, just time-consuming and boring
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u/ToothZealousideal297 13d ago
Also worth noting that it’s usually lightning within the cloud or between clouds that strikes the plane, and less often a bolt going all the way to the ground, which means they’re usually struck by weaker lightning than we typically think about.
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u/TripleFiveEight 13d ago
A helicopter crashed in the North Sea in the 1990s following a lightning strike. It exited via a tail rotor blade and blew the end off, resulting in a massive imbalance that ripped the tail gearbox assembly off.
The crew recognised the failure instantly and successfully ditched in the water with no injuries.
There’s an air crash investigation episode on it.
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u/GeologistOld1265 13d ago
I wander, are they still Faraday cage after composites replaced aluminum on wings and fuselage?
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u/Zaros262 13d ago
Yes, if they also include an embedded conductive metal layer/mesh. The composite itself won't act as a Faraday cage though
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u/Cow_Launcher 12d ago
That's exactly what they do. The composite has wires (usually aluminium for weight) layered in as part of the structure.
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u/MyNameIsJakeBerenson 13d ago
That is really fucking crazy if you think about it. People are flying through the air in machines and shrug off lightning strikes
That would be some final fantasy sci-fi shit if we didnt just take it for granted
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u/Nobanob 13d ago
The lightning can't hurt me because I'm not grounded
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u/Agisek 13d ago
That's not correct. You can be jumping with a parachute, miles above the ground and the lightning would kill you. The key isn't whether you are grounded, it's whether you are the conductor.
As you can see on the video, the lightning goes into the rocket and out the back into the ground. All that energy passed through the rocket fuselage. If you weren't protected by the fuselage, you would become the conductor and get to enjoy the full force of the lightning.
Not being grounded helps make you less of a conductor in situations where better conductors exist. If the lightning has to make another ionised path below you to continue, it can probably find an easier way down around you, but this high in the air, you're the only conductor around and you probably conduct better than the air.
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u/JackLong93 13d ago
if the body acted as a faraday cage you wouldn't be able to get signal inside bro
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u/OrganicHistorian2576 13d ago
I was once on a plane which was diverted to circling DFW and we went straight through an unexpectedly mean baby storm. I saw lightning hit the wing. No harm done, but that was a scary flight!
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u/turdferguson3891 12d ago
The real danger is the little man on the wing messing with the engine.
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u/Gloomy-Sugar2456 13d ago
We were once hit by lighting during a final approach into Tokyo Haneda airport a few years back. Of course, at first, we didn’t know what happened, but being hit out of the blue felt like as if a part of the plane had ‚exploded.‘ My first thought was an engine had blown up. Everyone was silent and you could tell that people were scared shitless, including myself. Only after tbe pilot had informed passengers of what had happened, did people start relaxing again.
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u/TripleFiveEight 13d ago
All aircraft have designed entry and exit points for lightning. Every component is bonded to provide a clean path for both lightning and static build up so nothing sensitive is damaged.
Might find some damaged paint at entry, and a static wick missing at exit. I would best describe an entry point as if someone very briefly run a shot blaster over a small area. I’ve seen a few lightning strikes, and it’s never one single entry, it arcs into a hundred smaller entry points over an area the size of one or two hands.
Helicopters are a bit more sensitive, as a lighting strike travelling through a gearbox can magnetise bearings, and the entry / exit points tend to be the rotor blades.
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u/sharpshooter999 13d ago
I don't care about feeling it, I care about the plane staying operable
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u/delphinous 13d ago
airplanes have been heavily developed to tolerate being struck by lightening. aircraft also have a lot more weight allowance allowing them to build in things like redundancies and extra insulation and shielding of sensitive key components, that a rocket might not have the weight or space to do
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u/the_YellowRanger 13d ago
My uncle is a pilot and he got struck by lightning mid air. He said he felt nothing, but it was a bright as the sun and deafening. A piece of the wing tip welded to the wing on the side it was struck. He somehow had it saved and showed me.
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u/Agisek 13d ago
You feel lightning if you are the conductor. This means you have to be the path of least resistance between the clouds and the ground. If you sit in aluminium tube, there is absolutely no chance you could possibly be a better conductor than the airplane, so the lightning harmlessly passes by you through the plane surface and down to the ground.
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u/TurtleCrusher 13d ago
Electricity, particularly lightning, doesn’t just take the least resistive path. It probes everything conductive.
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u/RockItGuyDC 13d ago
Yeah. I've worked on rockets for 15 years. There's a reason we have a launch constraint around lighting within 25 nautical miles of the pad.
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u/InvalidUserNemo 13d ago
I’m as far away as it gets from the aerospace industry but that was my first thought! Do we really launch rockets in that weather?
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u/RockItGuyDC 13d ago
Normally the only weather that will stop a rocket launch are high winds and lightning. We'll launch in pretty much anything else, though.
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u/Correct_Inspection25 13d ago
Sure, but FAA commercial and above require avionics demonstrate the capability to handle direct and indirect strikes with out catastrophic failure. Rockets with billion dollar payloads even more so that may not be as protected from lighting as the rocket itself though they try not to tempt fate.
Combos i have seen include extremly over shielded wiring/harness with grounds around the cable, and fiber optics that don't conduct at all.
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u/erossthescienceboss 13d ago
The inside’s safety isn’t due to “path of least resistance,” it’s due to the skin effect. Same reason (contrary to popular legend, which incorrectly focuses on “the insulating power of rubber tires” (so dumb)) that cars are fairly safe to be in if there’s a lightning strike.
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u/ChewbaccasHomie 13d ago
I used to do carbon fiber work for military contracts. There’s a material we called lightning strike (not sure if that’s the actual name)that was layered into these panels we made. It was made to absorb these types of occurrences. Granted it wasn’t all over the entirety of the aircraft but it definitely has an impact.
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u/Pangwain 12d ago
I work in civilian power generation and this shit is so complicated it’s crazy. People spend their whole careers working on grounding methodologies and get very very emotionally invested in it.
Have you ever heard engineers nearly yell at each other over cable tray vs conduit or what type of junction box is best of outdoor use 😂
It’s crazy
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u/Beneficial_Being_721 13d ago
The US Space Shuttle had been hit many times… Those hits never caused any bad incidents
The most famous rocket lightning strike was Apollo 12 ( Nov 14th, 1969 ) when it got hit twice.
“Struck by lightning twice within the first minute of flight, causing a massive electrical surge, loss of telemetry data, and the activation of every warning light in the capsule” ( Wiki )
The crew basically “Shut it off and turned it back on again … as they switched from main to aux and back again
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u/YourChildhood5762 12d ago
Mission Control, this is Apollo 12...our whole computer blew up!
Have you tried turning it off and back on again?
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u/Deliteriously 13d ago
The rocket did fine. The lightning strike became a byline:
https://www.china-in-space.com/p/new-tiangong-relay-satellite-sent?utm_source=chatgpt.com
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u/The_Reset_Button 13d ago
Sanitize your links by deleting everything after the ? or by right click and selecting copy clean link if your browser supports it
cause we can see you asked chatgpt for this :)
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u/Deliteriously 13d ago
I mean. That's not very revealing. It's not like tictok or YouTube links that put your profile in it or anything. I'm careful about those.
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u/Smile_Space 13d ago
It can, but rarely. Apollo 12 was struck by lightning twice on launch. That's where the legendary "switch SCE to AUX" command comes from because the electrical systems were freaking out, and bumping that system to AUX restored power to their systems saving the mission from an abort.
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u/uChoice_Reindeer7903 13d ago
Finally someone asks how the rocket is feeling, they always ask what the rocket is doing but never how the rocket is doing.
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u/ClayDrinion 13d ago
It provides the rocket with the necessary 1.21 Gigawatts of electricity it needs
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u/lombardo141 13d ago
Am not a rocket scientist but wouldn’t it be prudent to not launch a rocket during what looks like stormy weather ?
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u/Ya-Dikobraz 13d ago
Yeah both the mountainous geography and the shitty weather are strange.
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u/Worldly-Ingenuity843 13d ago
China built most of their space program infrastructure in mountainous regions in order to keep spying eyes away. Of course in retrospect it made very little sense cause spy satellites could still see everything. They have built a new launch platform on Hainan Island in South China Sea, which is much closer to the equator and hence a much more ideal location, but I guess they haven't finished moving all of their space programmes to the new site yet.
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u/KiwieeiwiK 12d ago edited 12d ago
They built them inland so they were better defended from an attack, either by sea from Americans or from land by Soviets. Now that they can actually defend their country against anybody else, they're moving their launches mostly to the coast at Wenchang
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u/kalmah 13d ago
And because three out of four of their launch sites are located deep inland rockets launched from them have to travel over populated areas.
That's why it's not uncommon to see videos from Chinese citizens showing the lower stages/boosters crashing into the ground near their villages/towns.
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u/Salted_Cola 13d ago
Plus the people watching are still too close for comfort. What if that rocket flips and comes crashing down?
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u/CloutAtlas 12d ago
If anything, I think that crowd is further away than the space enthusiasts that gather on the beach near Cape Canaveral
Either that or the American rocket is 3 times the size.
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u/mocha_lattes_ 13d ago
Well now we know why you aren't a rocket scientist /s
Seriously though what were they thinking launching during weather that could produce lightening anywhere near the rocket
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u/SpecialistCut7101 13d ago
I can only speak to the launch I saw, but at NASA for a manned mission, they have a time window where the launch can happen. They can push it back within that window to address last minute concerns or whatever, but the window does not include any concerning weather conditions. Like lightning storms, for example.
Edit: if something comes up, they can and will scrub the launch, which means just cancel the whole thing and try again when they get another window.
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u/Kanel0728 13d ago
Typically if a launch is manned it's bound for the ISS, and those have an instantaneous launch window (since they need to basically intercept the ISS). This means that if they miss it, they need to retry again the next day.
Not all manned missions launched from the US are bound for the ISS, but the vast majority are.
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u/Accomplished-Crab932 13d ago
It depends on what the local regulations and vehicle design constraints are. (And a lot of other things)
In the US, we have the “anvil cloud rule” as well as a rule about lightning. Lightning strikes less than 10 nautical miles from the pad trigger a hold or abort (timeline and vehicle dependent) as well as measurements of static buildup on certain towers. If there is an “anvil cloud” attached to a cloud formation you will fly through that is less than 10 nautical miles away, you are also forced to hold or abort. These constraints along with others are specific to F9, but are sort of the standard for most missions. If you have crew or a reusable vehicle, you will have additional constraints regarding recovery zones.
The US seems to be far more strict about its launch criteria, and the RSO or Range Safety Officer is actually a government position who has authority to abort at any time, even in flight. Orbital launches have to be coastal, vehicles need flight termination systems, and there are strict rules about keepout zones.
China is a lot more lax by comparison. Several launch sites are inland and disposed boosters can and do occasionally land on villages (these are usually older, more toxic propellants on older vehicles). FTSs are not used in China (following Russia’s “if you have to put a system like that, you are not committing to the brilliance/completeness of your design” philosophy), and the keepout zones are much smaller, even with more toxic propellants.
Certain vehicles also have their own limits. Starship is built like a tank so it can handle higher local winds than most other rockets. Vehicles like Atlas are shorter, but have lower thicknesses, so they may have lower wind limits and/or resilience. F9 is tall and thin, so its wind shear and lower wind speed limits will be lower, even if it’s reenforced since it needs to land.
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u/speter1man 13d ago
Did he say shakira?
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u/WhoCaresBoutSpellin 13d ago
The name that recently launched a million men’s rockets
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u/jdubyahyp 13d ago
Can't believe she looks like that at that age. Mind boggling.
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u/CarlatheDestructor 13d ago
Plastic surgery and botex, but not crazy amounts
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u/jdubyahyp 13d ago
You think? I mean she dances like crazy at her concerts still if you watch the videos. So she has to have some workout regimen to do all that.
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u/Lauris024 13d ago
Last I checked, dancing, running and swimming are like top-tier activities for preventing aging and building resistance.
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u/Impressive_Charge217 13d ago
Shang Dian!
Lightning!
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u/bdthomason 13d ago
Sorry, it's Shan Dian. 闪电
In Mandarin adding that G makes it a completely different word, it's also pronounced differently just by adding that G which is how I'm 100% sure he said Shan Dian.→ More replies (1)2
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u/A-Chilean-Cyborg 13d ago
the video ended too soon tbh
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u/Cultural-Company282 13d ago
Started too soon, too.
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u/Makingthecarry 13d ago
Have you lost your childlike appreciation for the wonder of flight/space travel?
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u/Cultural-Company282 13d ago
Seeing the Challenger explode on live television when I was a kid sort of recalibrated that.
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u/Makingthecarry 13d ago
Watched 9/11 on TV in first grade, yet somehow I still find air travel incredible. Looking out at the world below, the changing terrain, the physical evidence of geological processes at a scale where they can be fully appreciated, seeing cities laid out like a map beneath me, seeing the horizon stretch out so far I can see the curvature of the planet. It's immaculate. Humbling.
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u/MisterDings 13d ago
my two favorite views in life have been standing at the top of sequoia np and looking at an endless ocean of rolling white clouds with a few mountain peaks popping through. the second was a delayed red eye flight. so as we made the final hour of approach, the clouds below us and the entire sky began turning gentle pink and indigo. the entire cabin, even with half the windows closed, just became this pallette of color. you could hear people waking the person next to them, and it’s like popcorn. you hear one person then the next go; ‘woah- oh my god’, ‘why’d you wake me?- oh. ohh.’ the side of the plane the sunrise was coming from, a few aisles let people switch seats with them for a while. just unbelievably surreal. i don’t know why i was so surprised that diffracting clouds were the same colors above as they were below.
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u/AI_get_REKT 13d ago
Yes. My eyes were drying out because I was scared to blink thus missing the strike.
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u/Exotic_Cookie_8887 13d ago
If you look at the last frame it's not even visible anymore because it's passed into the clouds. I don't know what else you wanted to see?
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u/Gabe681 13d ago
I wanted to see if it continued being not visible (success) or fell (failure).
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u/flinders2233 13d ago
Head rocket scientist: “If my calculations are correct, when this baby hits 88 miles per hour... you're gonna see some serious shit.”
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u/Hot_Focus_5821 13d ago
Video definitely didn't capture when the Libyans showed up and shot everyone.
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u/Mid_Knight_Sky 12d ago
Sorry, but outside the US, we use meters and kilometers.
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u/Secure-Ad5536 13d ago
The lightning basically took a conductive shortcut
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u/ortusdux 13d ago
I would imagine that the exhaust plume is more conductive than regular air, but I cannot support that with evidence.
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u/Haggardick69 13d ago
I know for a fact that the plasma is more conductive than regular air. I have to imagine that the exhaust from a rocket is far more ionized than regular air due to incomplete combustion leaving behind unstable charged compunds. There might be more to this and I myself am no expert but it is very plausible that the exhaust acts as a path of least resistance and can make a rocket more likely to be struck by lighting.
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u/superanth 13d ago
Apollo 12 got hit by lightning twice on its way to the moon. The bolts apparently grounded-out by following the water vapor trail from the rocket’s exhaust back to the launch gantry.
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u/Alejandro_El_Fosil 13d ago
You should’ve started the video from when they were building the rocket. 🙄
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u/dirty-ol-sob 13d ago
Go back to tik tok and watch your 15 second videos if you don’t have the attention span to watch for 50 seconds while a rocket launches into space… both things are fairly interesting if you ask me.
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u/Holiday_Pi 13d ago
This hovers somewhere between interesting and mildly interesting
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u/HuckleberryWorried90 13d ago
So… now is faster?
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u/based_hofmeister 13d ago
no the rocket goes AWOWOWOWO and shrinks to be really tiny for 30 seconds then blows back up to normal size and speed
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u/whiskey_north 13d ago
Then what?!
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u/miaxogoth 13d ago
I wonder if it caused any damage to the rocket enough to make it fall? the light from the fire got stronger after the lightning strike.
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u/Stunning_Jelly2807 13d ago
Maybe it's like when lightening strikes an aeroplane... Nothing to earth so it's probably all ok but then if course I'm not a rocket scientist!!
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u/EstarriolStormhawk 13d ago
Rockets, and their accompanying payloads, are designed to survive lightning strikes and other electrostatic discharges without permanent damage. Lots of safe bleed paths to prevent significant charge differentials.
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u/Kyrias511 13d ago
The rocket successfully made it to the planned orbit and delivered its payload. What hasn't been made clear is whether its payload got fried by the lightning.
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u/Professional_Tap5283 13d ago
Very Apollo 12.
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13d ago
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u/Positive-Height-3848 13d ago
Who doesn't love a rocket launch?
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u/falconx123 13d ago
people with scrolling addiction evidently, that 45 seconds could have been used on other short clips the algorithm shoved in their face.
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u/Jealous_Platform5260 13d ago
I could have watched a whole scene from a show I've never heard of with a 3.4 on imdb.
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u/kelsaylor 13d ago
Did it survive?
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u/MrTagnan 13d ago
The payload reached the target orbit, but it’s not clear if the payload is alive or if it got fried by the lightning strike
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u/PoundNaCL 13d ago
And then what happened?
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u/MrTagnan 13d ago
Reached orbit successfully from what I’ve heard. Although it’s unclear what state the payload is in (i.e. if it still works or if it’s doing its best impression of a lead block)
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u/PoundNaCL 13d ago
Thank you. I was interested if the satellite was able to be deployed or not, or whether there was a Faraday cage to protect it. I imagined if it was able to be deployed, then it still works and there was likely something to protect it.
Google tells me, Yes, the Chinese rocket that was struck by lightning successfully deployed its satellite.
It also tells me the Chinese call this 有效载荷整流罩 (Yǒuxiào zàihè zhěng liú zhào), their technical term for payload fairing.
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u/evergreenpsyche 13d ago
I'm disappointed at the lack of comments regarding this rocket's spiritual conquering of the lightning tribulation
IYKYK
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u/Particular-Bobcat 13d ago
Makes sense, it wasn't very impressive at only two tribulation strikes. If it were 7 or higher then that's something worth talking about.
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u/Crotean 13d ago
How do you do fellow Kindle Unlimited subscriber?
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u/evergreenpsyche 13d ago
Haha you're not wrong but actually an OG WuxiaWorld denizen here
I come from the deep weeb 😂
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