TBH this is very cool.
It does put a lot of dense civilization downrange of the launch site, though. Thats… risky. Spaceports are often on eastern coasts for this reason.
I think most launches are expected to be polar, heading southwards
Do you think Starship will ever be reliable enough to fly over populated areas? Maybe not over big cities but like airplanes maybe?
I don’t think any spacecraft is, not even the Soyuz rockets that were basically bulletproof for decades.
No matter how advanced it is, a rocket is basically a giant soda can filled with explosives. The mass fraction is just so different than an airplane, so it has to be treated accordingly.
The noise is likely what keeps them away from populated areas. Similar to the concord.
Reliably - I think they’ll fly often enough to get falcon 9 like reliability
Ah, yeah, that’s much better.
Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I’ve seen in this thread:
Fewer Letters More Letters GSE Ground Support Equipment NOTAM Notice to Air Missions of flight hazards Jargon Definition scrub Launch postponement for any reason (commonly GSE issues)
[Thread #6 for this comm, first seen 29th Aug 2026, 16:45] [FAQ] [Full list] [Contact] [Source code]
