You aren't going to treat the rocket as a spar bouy and start the engine up
in the ocean are you? I imagine the native Hawaiians will unleash a shit
storm on you if there's even a small chance you might blow out the ear
drums of migrating whales.
On Mon, Mar 11, 2019 at 7:53 PM David Summers <dvidsum@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
As Henry mentioned, no matter what you need to involve the FAA-AST. We
haven't gotten deep into discussions yet, so take all this with a grain of
salt. We also started under the assumptions of a launch from an existing
range (someone else was going to pay for that, so why not), so we already
had a lot of the work done.
1. We are beyond the control of air traffic control officially.
Unofficially, we will obviously need to issue NOTAMS, etc. There aren't
that many flights to the south of the big island, though. (Only French
Polynesia)
2. I have yet to experience the joy of the environmental impact study...
3. Range safety is a lot easier when you launch 20 miles from anyone, and
aim away from everyone! The monte carlo simulation says that we meet the
legal requirements without even a way to shut the engine down! (We are not
doing that, of course. We have manual and automatic abort methods.)
4. We aren't exporting, as long as we don't land anywhere else. The ship
is a floating chunk of US Territory.
5. The FCC also claims jurisdiction even in international waters, so we
still have to comply with the rules.
Keeping launch platforms stable is actually fairly straightforward - you
use a spar bouy. It really helps to have a small and light vehicle for
that, though! Right now, we are planning on 15 ft waves. We can likely
handle bigger if needed, but I'm not sure I want to be on a boat to get out
there in 15 ft waves, even if the platform handles it OK. (Maybe if we
involve the Navy - I understand they have a few vessels that don't sway in
Pearl)
Thanks!
-David Summers
On Mon, Mar 11, 2019 at 12:34 PM <snyder@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
David,
I am Curious on how the FAA licensing is going.
Since you are well beyond the 12 mile limit,
(but inside the 200 mi exclusive economic zone) I am wondering
how much easier that might be than being closer to shore or at
a conventional launch range.
I had heard a quote from the FAA that they didn't really have much
jurisdiction beyond 12 miles, but that may have been just in
air traffic control.
ATC ?
Environmental impact ?
Range safety ?
Export controls ?
Is it general FAA or the "Office" ?
Oddly enough, our satellite had big problems with the FCC, who
gives out , much delayed and crippled, licenses for satellite
launches. And sometime the radios on board.
Thanks for any information, and I understand if there are
proprietary limitations to what you can say.
-Gary.
PS: I suppose a comment on the waves and Swells and keeping
you launch platform stable would be interesting also.
From: David Summers <dvidsum@xxxxxxxxx>of
Date: Fri, 8 Mar 2019 15:09:30 -0600
Subject: [AR] Re: What makes a useful launch vehicle?
Because of FAA licensing, we have just one launch point, 20 miles south
the big island of Hawaii, in international waters. I'm going to beliving
there anyway, might as well launch there!water.
Eventually, we will likely be able to launch from any large body of
-David