Talk:SpaceX CRS-8

Supply vs. assembly

Since this mission is adding a new module, albeit a temporary one, should this be considered an assembly flight rather then a logistics flight? Vegaswikian (talk) 19:32, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

Hi Vegaswikian. This may be one of those classic Einsteinian "frame of reference" problems. From the frame of reference of the ISS, it would appear that the ISS folks, and possibly the editors who frequent the ISS article on Wikipedia, it may be an assembly flight. However, from the frame of reference of the 8th cargo resupply mission that NASA has contracted to SpaceX to resupply the ISS, then it would be a logistics mission. (I'm no expert on the two types of "adjective" missions; I'm just accepting your comment at face value.)

In any case, I suspect there is a happy medium. Assuming there are good sources to back up the two type-of-mission point of view, in this article, we might choose to refer to it as the eighth cargo resupply commencial mission (or, at least, the 8th for SpaceX) that delivered a payload to support an additional (serendipitous) assembly mission, one that was unplanned as of the retirement of the Space Shuttle in 2011. In the meantime, we would expect the ISS article to speak to it in more esoteric ISS terms. Cheers. N2e (talk) 03:21, 23 January 2013 (UTC)

Launch Mid Nov 2015 or Jan 3 2016?

The ref for the Jan 3rd 2016 date seems to indicate launch Nov 15 or 16 is being evaluated. Is there a different source for Jan 3rd? 2 month slip from NET 2 September seems to also indicate November. crandles (talk) 11:42, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

It seems that SpaceX isn't feeling confident about launching CRS-8. The launch date has slipped from Jan 3, 2016 then to Feb 7, 2016 and now even that has been changed to NET March 21, 2016. After the successful launch of Jason-3 on Jan 17, 2016 the next flight on their manifest is now SES-9, to be followed by CRS-8. Considering their backlog they might have a tough time carrying out 1 launch every fortnight in March and April 2016 unless their entire manifest for 2016 is up in the air (spaceflightnow.com dated 16 Jan 2016)Abul Bakhtiar (talk) 05:36, 18 January 2016 (UTC).

Lots of flights have been delayed by 6 month gap for return to flight program (plus v1.1FT upgrades). It hasn't sorted itself out yet. Musk has said well over a dozen flights in 2016 but there are about 29 on the list suggesting a 2016 launch. Amended to NET 20 March 2016 per launch photography. crandles (talk) 11:30, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Launch schedule history:

The second and third paragraphs of this section in the main article are out of synch and could do with some revision to maintain chronology. I haven't done the needful as I don't want to hurt the last editor's feelings whoever they may be. Abul Bakhtiar (talk) 06:53, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

NASA CRS project Insignia (SpX-8) vs. Space-X Insignia

An image of SpaceX's insignia for their CRS-8 mission is available (e.g. http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=39537.0) and could be used in place of the NASA CRS-project's SpX-8 insignia which is currently shown on the page. This would bring the SpaceX CRS-8 page in line with the previous missions (CRS-1 through -7) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.244.87.136 (talk) 13:35, 18 March 2016 (UTC)

Rfc: Should we have a separate page for the launch or keep it with the payload?

After this launch succeeded in landing the first stage on the ocean platform, our esteemed colleague @Appable: made a separate page for Falcon 9 Flight 23, overriding the redirect to SpaceX CRS-8. His argument is that this flight is particularly notable and generated a lot of press coverage. That is absolutely true but I fail to see how opening a separate page for the launch is necessary. In my view, after the initial excitement due to the fresh news, such a page would inevitably rehash content about the rocket, the landing test, the SpaceX reusable launch system development program, the Commercial Resupply Services contract with NASA, the launch pad, landing zone and droneship. Oh, and something about LOX subcooling perhaps? Or Elon's other ventures? ;)

This article is short enough to accommodate details about both the payload and the flight. Let's enrich the existing page with links to the relevant topics and perhaps an extra mention of news coverage, but that's plenty enough (and you heard this from a major fan). Besides, there is already a lot of content overlap in the numerous pages dealing with SpaceX, so we should work on structuring them better, e.g. recent work on the reusability R&D page grouped a lot of information that was scattered on various research topics, technical components or individual flight tests. Pinging page creator @Vegaswikian: and regular contributors to SpaceX and spaceflight topics @N2e: @C-randles:@Abul Bakhtiar: @PSR B1937+21: @BatteryIncluded: @Galactic Penguin SST: @Kubanczyk: @Zedshort: @The Anome: to please comment and !vote. — JFG ^talk 10:32, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

Keep with payload at least at present. crandles (talk) 11:00, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

Keep with payload keep it simple Zedshort (talk) 14:12, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

For most of NASA's CRS and CCDev missions a separate article is not needed. PSR B1937+21 (talk) 11:07, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

My two cents: this is actually a somewhat complex topic, and not really sure where it should be discussed. First off, there is Wikiproject Spaceflight ordinary practice, and there are, no doubt, special cases, which might still be compliant with overall wiki-policy and guidelines.

So, in general within the spaceflight wikiproject in the distant past, the sat article has covered the launch. In past history, the sat was the story and the launch, generally, was not. Things have been gradually changing, both from the launch side (more notable launchers, doing new things (sophisticated flight tests, landings, potential reuse, ...) and from the satellite side (larger flights of small sats, sometimes resulting in no single launch article on the sat(s) at all, even though the launch is highly notable, etc.).

Examples where separate launch articles exist include Falcon 9 Flight 10, Falcon 9 Flight 20, Falcon 9 Flight 22, and perhaps some others. Each of these were created for (somewhat) different reasons. For example, I recall that the Flight 22 article was created when there was no specific article on the satellite itself (SES-9 redirected at the time to an an article about the SES company in general, with only a brief bit on each particular satellite, with high notability and sources about the impending launch. Only later did an editor create a separate sat article for SES-9.

In some cases the launch (recently) has been far more notable than the sat(s), which definitely allows articles to meet WP:GNG pretty clearly.

Moreover, once an article is created, failing any speedy deletion criteria applying, then the way to get an article's existence discussed is the WP:AfD process.

So yes, this likely needs more discussion, perhaps both in general and on the particular new article that you mention has been created (which I've not even yet clicked on). But not sure this Talk page is the place to do it, for the complex set of reasons I've just begun to outline. Cheers. N2e (talk) 11:48, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments, N2e, it all makes sense. For better or for worse, the discussion has started here so we might as well expand it to the general case, lest this gets rehashed for every new mission. For most spaceflights indeed, the focus has been on the payload, the launch event being a section in there and the infobox having information on the liftoff time, rocket, launchpad, etc. All manned flights have their own page, but you can consider that the payload is the crew in those cases. Space Shuttle flights have their own page because they carried diverse tasks beyond just deploying a satellite. In recent history, where a flight can carry dozens of small satellites and when the carrier rocket attracts more attention than the things it carries, such flights may indeed deserve their own page. I think that in most cases this can be resolved by simply choosing the most relevant page title. Examples:

• Dragon C2+, focus is on the payload making history (firs cargo delivery to the ISS by a privately-developed spacecraft), the flight itself is part of this narrative;
• Falcon 9 Flight 20, focus is on the flight making history (return-to-flight after 6 months hiatus, new rocket variant, landing success), payload has a section in there plus a link to the Orbcomm satellite operator but there is no page specifically for the OG-2 constellation; instead we have a redirect from Orbcomm OG-2 flight 2 to the Falcon flight page. Even if there was such a page in the future, it would not replace the flight page but rather explain how Orbcomm is making a splash in maritime cargo tracking and airline WiFi;
• ABS-3A and Eutelsat 115 West B are two satellites launched together; each page has a short section on the launch, which doesn't have a separate page (Falcon 9 Flight 16 redirects to the list of launches). So we could either create a page for the launch and repeat the usual "it's a Falcon 9, the greatest rocket ever built, it launched two satellites to GTO from LC40, it had a bunch of launch delays but was ultimately successful, and SpaceX tried landing it (well, not this one because the less-powerful v1.1 had no margins to return from GTO, but they will probably try to land flight 25 which carries the same twin Boeing 702SP electric-propulsion payloads (now that's notable)) or leave things as is or even merge both satellite pages, because ironically Eutelsat 115 West B talks a lot about ABS-3A and vice versa (which makes sense, as they are quasi twins);
• Falcon 9 Flight 21 is a case where a specific page was created for the flight and the payload, probably along the same arguments which would favor creating a page for flight 23 today. Well, this flight 21 page looks interesting but has no potential to grow. Substantive text about the flight itself consists of a paragraph on RTF considerations and a section on the landing attempt. This is in turn a mix of information readily available at the R&D page and recentist coverage which could very well be summed up and merged into the Jason-3 payload page. As the Jason-3 observatory returns science data over a decade, there will certainly be material to expand coverage, whereas once the rocket has been launched and the booster has broken its leg upon landing, there will hardly ever be anything more to say. I'd merge it in a heartbeat if we get consensus. Coverage of the landing is admittedly quite funny as the article text sources a statement copied verbatim from an Elon tweet by quoting the Washington Post which quotes the same tweet, adding instagram and SpaceX tweets as further "sources", ending up with 6 references to describe the broken leg incident — amusing yes, encyclopedic no)

TL;DR Keep spaceflight articles focused on the most notable things and give them appropriate titles. By this logic, the Falcon 9 maiden flight should be titled accordingly, instead of being listed today as Dragon Spacecraft Qualification Unit. — JFG ^talk 23:50, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

I don't know if I'm invited but thanks for the objective summary, JFG. Obviously, you know my opinion, but just wanted to comment that I've restarted the article in draftspace Draft:Falcon 9 Flight 23 so if anyone wants to contribute then feel free. Appable (talk) 19:25, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

Of course you are invited! We're all here to improve the encyclopedia together. — JFG ^talk 23:50, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

Landing vid

So Gizmodo and Wired made a GIF [1][2] out of the SpaceX landing video [3][4]; since this is just format conversion, the copyright would be whatever SpaceX has on it and not Gizmodo's. I suspect this is one of the SpaceX PD media, so would make a good upload. SpaceX's press gallery is PD, and Elon Musk said something of making everything PD, CC0 and CC-by-SA as possible (depending n outlet, since some media sharing sites do not allow PD or CC0 settings for content) -- 70.51.45.100 (talk) 10:45, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

Static picture is fine for an encyclopedia. Feel free to add the link to the video in the text or in a footnote. — JFG ^talk 15:37, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

While I would love for SpaceX videos to be CC-zero like the other media, we only know for sure that the media on their website and on their Flickr page are thus released. Hopefully I can get some clarification on this matter. Still images will have to suffice for now. — Huntster (t @ c) 01:12, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

Proposed infobox picture: BEAM

As lead picture for the article, we should replace the generic Dragon illustration with something specific to this mission. We show enough info on the (admittedly historic) landing, however this page is about the CRS-8 mission which carries a no-less-notable payload: the very first human-rated inflatable space habitat from Bigelow Aerospace to be attached to the ISS for two years... Can somebody find the energy to clear the rights to a picture of the BEAM? Or shall we wait until it gets deployed? That should generate some press coverage with pictures and videos too. — JFG ^talk 15:46, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

Maybe we could wait for some pictures taken by astronauts during capture and berthing and add them to infobox. Later, when they install BEAM we should definitely add some of those in the article as well, since it is the primary payload. I hope they will install some cameras in Russian segment , since BEAM inflation will look good from over there, and it's a great opportunity for some time lapse video. :) --Михаило Јовановић (talk) 17:53, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

The primary payload for the CRS-8 mission is the Dragon spacecraft, not BEAM. Also, Михаило Јовановић, even if more cameras were installed on the Russian segment, they would be copyright Roscosmos, not PD-NASA, so we could not use images from them anyway. — Huntster (t @ c) 01:14, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

Roscosmos copyright is pretty liberal, just requiring attribution: "Full or partial reproduction shall be followed by an appropriate link to Roscosmos web". For example, this gallery has nice views of Dragon. Agree with Михаило Јовановић on looking for real pictures when deployed. — JFG ^talk 02:52, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

That isn't a copyright statement, just a re-use statement. All Roscosmos material is All Rights Reserved unless specifically released, so it would only be valid under Fair Use, and since we have free alternatives we cannot use them here. — Huntster (t @ c) 05:35, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

I know they would be Roscosmos property, but I was thinking that Tim, Tim or Jeff could go to Rassvet, or Soyuz, and put some cameras inside them to take pictures and videos. I bet there is at least one window pointing towards BEAM when installed. Unless that kind of action is forbidden on ISS? --Михаило Јовановић (talk) 07:41, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

Reduce page protection to make external link edit

Hello, I was attempting to add an external link to this page and could not find an 'Edit' link. This is the first time I've run into this. How do I get the protection reduced to make an edit in the external link section?

Thank you --I-otanasatech (talk) 22:51, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

You can always paste the link here and have someone who can edit through protection add it. Mind you, external links are not supposed to be indiscriminate collections. — Huntster (t @ c) 01:15, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

Thank you for your reply. This is the first I've seen of a protected page. The information about the restrictions said I could request a lowering of the protection to post to the page. I've posted my web pages of previous SpaceX launches without issue.

Regarding indiscriminate collections, I hope launch pictures of CRS-8 from the NASA press site at CCAFS has sufficient relevance to be applicable here.

Here's the page: http://nasatech.net/ntCRS-8_PAGE.html

--I-otanasatech (talk) 01:45, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

I like the NASA Tech site, but considering we have a lot of photos at commons:Category:SpaceX CRS-8, it feels a bit redundant. — Huntster (t @ c) 05:39, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

It was always my intention to add to the body of media content on a relevant article. Since I don't wish to relinquish my copyright by putting it in the public domain, I thought the external link option was an acceptable compromise. But, that said, if my content is redundant or even superfluous to the Wiki page then I'll remove it. I do not want my content to be controversial or problematic in any way. --50.150.247.53 (talk) 15:03, 11 April 2016 (UTC)