HN Theater @HNTheaterMonth

Here is 500 fps film of the Saturn V launch for Apollo 11, narrated by Mark Gray. It explains the sequence of events over the course of 8+ minutes (30 seconds real time).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKtVpvzUF1Y

⬐ tigeba

A portion of flown engine #5 from the Apollo 11 mission on display at the Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center. It was retrieved in 2013 put on display in 2015.

⬐ mywacaday

Thanks for that, great video that led me to this, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImoQqNyRL8Y, sound recording organised by Dustin from SmarterEveryDay of the latest SpaceX launch, the sonic booms of the boosters coming into land are amazing, listen with headphones!

⬐ tim333

Cool. Shame they couldn't have a microphone by the landing site so the sound comes at the same time as the landing - maybe on a future one.

⬐ mikejb

Just as a Side-note: that video is from the Falcon Heavy demo launch last year.

The recent launch was the first commercial Falcon Heavy launch (Arabsat 6a)

⬐ banku_brougham

It goves me an appreciation for the energy required to lift something heavy out of Earth’s gravity, as well as the expense. It makes missions to Mars, or even economical asteroid mining seem further and further away.

⬐ techdragon

It’s LC-39A, pad camera E-8.

Soon as I saw the title card I could stop playing, I’ve watched and rewatched this footage so much i can play it back in my mind. If you haven’t seen it and you love rockets, this is a must watch, the F-1 engine in all its glory. The details are clear enough you can clearly see the turbopump exhaust stream flow interacting with the rest of the combustion chamber “rocket exhaust”.

⬐ yashevde

why would you stop playing something so good?? haha

it's the same for me -- every time I see a reference to rocketry I find myself re-watching this video. The commentary is useful to learn more from an engineering standpoint as well.

⬐ collinmanderson

I found the first minutes to be fascinating.

The F1 engine [1] (Saturn V, first stage) used another interesting way to improve efficiency with a gas generator cycle: using the turbopump exhaust gas as a cooling film in the engine nozzle. The fuel-rich exhaust was relatively cool compared to the flame generated by the rocket engine itself, and thus protected the nozzle from the most intense heat.

This is why, close up, the flame looks almost black close to the nozzle [2].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocketdyne_F-1

[2] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/71/F-1_Engi...

Edit: Hopefully clarified a little, and changed the link in [2] (from https://youtu.be/DKtVpvzUF1Y?t=125).

⬐ chimere

This is called film cooling, and SpaceX actually does use it on their second stage engine, the Merlin vacuum variant (MVac). You can see the beautiful exhaust plenum wrapping around the nozzle [1].

This isn't used for the regeneratively-cooled portion of the nozzle, but for the large radiatively-cooled nozzle extension, visible here [2].

[1] http://imgur.com/HvtBYIi

[2] https://i.stack.imgur.com/9qIFO.jpg

This version of the same video includes informative narration of what are the first 30 seconds after Apollo 11 liftoff:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKtVpvzUF1Y

⬐ filipmandaric

I actually contemplated posting this narrated version, which offers a great explanation of what is happening technically.

But I ultimately chose this one because there's something very inspiring about watching the raw footage in silence.

Unlikely, it wouldn't be much of a launch pad if it couldn't handle failure modes for rockets (aka bombs with a hole in one end). Compare to this Saturn V launch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKtVpvzUF1Y

⬐ manarth

The video points out two of the protection features, but they wouldn't do so well with a RUD.

The tower features - the hold-down arms, etc - are painted with a sacrificial paint. The idea is that it's the paint that chars and burns, rather than the tower features.

Then there's the water deluge system.

In the video, the rocket and exhaust is clear of the tower, and the fires are out, within 30 seconds. Neither the sacrificial paint nor the water deluge are designed to handle long-duration fires from a RUD.

After a 2014 Antares rocket failure, the launchpad at Wallops Flight Facility took 1 year and $15 million to repair [1].

[1] http://www.space.com/31412-virginia-launchpad-private-rocket...

⬐ CydeWeys

It would be incredibly difficult to armor a launch pad to survive an explosion on-pad, so they aren't. The real solution is to have multiple launch pads (the space shuttle had three), so that if one blows up on the pad you have backups you can use until the blown up one is rebuilt.

The energy released in the first few seconds of a controlled launch is not remotely comparable to the energy released by an entire rocket blowing up simultaneously. Also, with an explosion, the entire rocket, along with parts of the strongback and other structures it's attached to, become shrapnel. Superheated water exhaust is a lot easier to protect against.

I hope then that you have seen this classic Saturn V footage then:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKtVpvzUF1Y

⬐ aquadrop

Thanks for the link, powerful footage.

⬐ blacksmith_tb

The Apollo 11 launch features prominently in Godfrey Reggio / Philip Glass's _Koyaanisqatsi_ [1], so most art house theater-goers will have seen it, I would think.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koyaanisqatsi#Synopsis

I'd nominate this guy. (Saturn V launch high speed video with commentary) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKtVpvzUF1Y