The sun rose on a crystal clear day at Cape Canaveral. On Pads 38A and 38B, two giant towers of metal rose skyward, casting immense shadows across the wetlands. Sleipnir 1 stood on 38A, entering its final prelaunch checks. A smaller crew monitored Sleipnir 2 on pad 38B, from which it would launch on the morrow. Sleipnir 3 sat in the Vehicle Assembly Building on the immense crawler, ready to be transported out to 38A once Sleipnir 1 was on its way.
Just outside the exclusion zones on land and sea, tens of thousands of people gathered. They gathered in cars and trucks and campers. They gathered on fishing boats and yachts and cruise liners. They came as close as they could, keeping security guards and soldiers and navy ships and coast guard cutters busy maintaining the cordon around the space center.
Millions, even billions more, watched on television, on the Internet, by radio and phone and any means they could. The world wanted to know: would the first attempt by man to send an emergency resupply mission to another planet succeed?
HERMES – ARES III MISSION DAY 303
Everyone crowded around Johannsen’s console, listening to the two-minute-delayed audio broadcast of the countdown from Earth. They relayed the signal on to Friendship’s radio, because although the alien ship’s radio signal was no longer clear enough to send voice broadcasts, Hermes’s superior signal strength allowed voice messages to travel the other way.
The crew leaned forward as they heard Mitch Henderson’s voice crackle over the speakers, “This is the Flight Director. Begin launch status check.”
None of the Ares III crew spoke as the Florida launch controller ran down the go/no go list, getting responses of Go from each controller. There was a slight rustling on the bridge as Mitch reported that Sleipnir 1 was go for launch on schedule, as everyone unconsciously shifted against Hermes’s rotation-simulated gravity.
One by one, the countdown callouts rang out. The Red Falcon shifted to internal power, its computers taking over the flight sequence. Fuel lines were disconnected. Final automated checks were made, reported as good. And the count rolled on.
At fifteen seconds the launch timer began reading the seconds out loud. The Hermes crew leaned forward almost as one person.
“Six… five… four…”
Martinez, who had been praying silently, began reciting the Ave Maria aloud.
“Ignition sequence start.”
Beck’s hand grasped Johannsen’s shoulder. She didn’t flinch.
“Three… two…”
Vogel stared at the deck and said nothing.
“Ignition.”
Lewis stood a step behind the others, arms folded, hands gripping her upper arms so her fingers wouldn’t drum on her sleeves.
“one… and liftoff! Liftoff of the SpaceX Red Falcon, carrying the supply probe Sleipnir 1 to the Ares III habitat on Mars.”
None of the crew let out any sighs of relief. They would be premature. No Ares supply mission had failed yet, but they had seen numerous satellite launches fail, for one reason and another. There was no such thing as a guaranteed successful launch.
“Trim?” With liftoff, control of the flight automatically handed off to Mission Control at Houston. Mitch Henderson had taken command.
“Trim’s good, Flight.”
“Course?”
“On course, Flight.”
“Altitude one thousand meters. Safe abort reached.”
“Pitch and roll program commencing.”
“Thirty seconds to max-Q.”
“Getting a little shimmy, Flight.”
That caught everyone’s attention. During launch, the less you heard on the controller channel, the better. The word shimmy should never come up at all.
“Say again?”
“We have a slight longitudinal vibration, Flight. Computer’s handling it.”
One of the multiple engines in the first stage of the Red Falcon booster had a very slight clog in its fuel pump. This caused the engine to sputter slightly, shaking the craft in an unexpected, but not disastrous, manner. It was just one more vibration on top of several sources of buffeting the ship would encounter in the course of a normal ascent.
But inside the rocket’s first stage, one of the wires leading to a control gyro had a weak spot, hidden by insulation and not caught by the inspection many weeks beforehand. The wire stretched and snapped inside the insulation, sending its signal to the first stage computer in weak, sporadic sparks instead of a steady stream of data. This fault, unexpected and previously unencountered outside of simulations, caused the first stage computer to attempt to compensate for what it thought was a sudden and severe change in pitch.
One point five seconds later, the computer recognized the fault, cut the sensor out of its decision loop, and attempted to correct its error. Unfortunately this happened about one second too late.
“WHOA!”
The bottom dropped out of the stomachs of the listening Ares astronauts.
“Flight, the ship just pitched down hard.”
“Can you correct?”
“Getting ratty data here, Flight.”
“Craft’s pulling five G’s and rising.”
“Computer’s attempting to compensate, but we’re still tracking below target trajectory.”
“Get it back on course,” Mitch ordered breathlessly.
“Ten seconds to max Q.”
For a second and a half the flight computer of Sleipnir 1’s first stage had believed that it was pitching up well out of its prograde vector. It compensated as best it could by throttling certain engines and pivoting its engine bells for maximum downward pitch. This put its nose well outside the prograde vector in the opposite direction, just at the moment when the ship was about to experience the highest aerodynamic stress load of the flight- “max Q”.
Air approached the point of incompressibility as the rocket continued to accelerate. The hardening air pushed against the upper side of the imbalanced rocket, shoving it towards the ground, even as the computer tried to bring its nose back in line with its pre-programmed trajectory.
Red Falcon was the most powerful booster system humanity had ever flown successfully. But this time the strength of the rocket worked against it, because the same thrust that tried to compensate for the misalignment also accelerated the ship closer to max Q, harder against the unyielding atmospheric forces.
At almost any other point in the flight the error might have been survivable. Not this time, not this place.
The linkage between the first and the second stage failed, and the giant rocket broke in two. The first stage plowed headlong into the second stage and the probe.
The fireball was visible for miles and miles in the clear skies off the eastern coast of Florida.
On Hermes, the crew listened to the end.
“We’ve lost readings on the probe, Flight.”
“Lost the probe?” Mitch again. “Entirely lost the probe?”
“First stage guidance LOS, Flight.”
“Second stage LOS, Flight.”
“Reestablish.”
Martinez, listening to this, slammed a fist into the bulkhead. “Shit!”
“No luck.”
“Satcon?”
“No satellite acquisition of signal.”
“Ground?”
“Flight, we see a large fireball downrange at the approximate last observed position of Sleipnir 1.”
“Flight, USS Stockton reports debris falling into the exclusion zone.”
A long moment of silence followed, broken by Mitch Henderson’s voice, much subdued, saying, “GC, Flight. Lock the doors.”
Vogel looked at the deck and said nothing.
Beck squeezed Johannsen’s shoulder tighter.
Lewis spoke. “Okay, back on task, people,” she said. “This was only one of three. NASA made these redundant for a reason. Mark and his friends will be fine if they get the other two.”
The next day Sleipnir 2 launched without incident, achieving first Earth orbit and then Mars insertion trajectory with perfect precision. Almost one hundred sols’s worth of food, plus spare hab canvas and other spare parts, were on course for a Sol 585 landing somewhere to the south of the Ares III Hab.
The crew of Hermes listened, relaxed slightly, and crossed their fingers for Sleipnir 3.
So was this the strange coloration thing? Or is this for Sleipnir 2?
Relax on the buffer, you did a heack of a job keeping it going as long as you did, so if you have to permanently kill the buffer it is understandable due to the hecktic few weeks you had. Question is, can the crew survive with just one successful probe?
... Well, at least one of the probes made it. Can we go for two of three?
Don't sweat it. We can wait a few days for you to rebuild your buffer.
Probably should be "the"
Failure during launch. Bugger. As for the 'could this actually bring down a rocket' angle mentioned in the author's notes, well, I dunno about the specifics with the sensor wiring. But if a rocket tipped too far, then it would absolutely fold like a cheap suit - and with something the size of SpaceX's upcoming BFR, the ensuing fireball would probably set a record for the largest non-nuclear explosion ever.
At least Mark and his new friends have one supply pod on the way, with another on the way to the pad.
Sure, its writing, not rocket science. It's not like we're dying while you supply us the next chapter.
It might be time you take a week off? build a buffer. I will take quality over quantity in my reading.
now lets hope all 3 make it there.
while also maybe seeds video games songs books and other things like idk stuff to make a new hab farm?
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I would guess there is redundancy for the sensor. But i'm not a rocket scientist.
Well I hope that discoloration on the oxygen tank in Sleipnir 3 (Sol 151) doesn't come back to haunt them
Maybe this loss will cause NASA to quintuple check the last booster to confirm it's all good; who cares it if launches a week or two late if it assures it can leave the atmosphere at all! With the cave farm starting to produce a surplus and NASA knowing that, they should do everything in their power to prevent a repeat explosion!
man crazy idea i have for Borderlands if that game is still being made by 2030s. I bet fireball and everyone would love it as them as DLC characters
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SpaceX certainly like their redundancies - that's part of the reason the Falcon 9 has 9 engines, and why they have multiple computers voting on how to fly the rocket.
I know that if I was they guy designing the rocket, I'd have at least 3 (ideally more) copies of any sensors, and the computers would be programmed to ignore outliers - like you'd get from a loose wire.
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"Say hello,Butt Stallion!"
"What in the stick is this?"
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The 2013 russian Proton-M crashed due to sensor problems
without redundancies in place. I would hope spaceX took note. On the other hand it proofs that this kind of stuff happens.What a twist will it be if it crashes exactly into the Hab.
Or the cave for that matter.
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...I would be okay with this.
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potato stew w/ potatoes, potatoes, and potatoes, and a delicious potato gravy
I'd be experimenting to find some safe way to get an alternative cooking method to the microwave. No fat for frying unfortunately, but even just some browning over an open flame would add some variety to the taste and texture.
Called it; and yes, that would absolutely be one way to lose a launch vehicle.
Programmers have said it since the dawn of time: computers are dumb, don't count on them to do anything important. And it's true, for the most part. You have to spell EVERYTHING out for them, they're prone to over-correct (if they correct in the first place) and encountering a problem that wasn't accounted for by the programmer would definitely trigger a wildcard response like that.
Ironically, it seems to be a thing with missions that get the number 1, encountering fiery endings like that...
On the previous chapter:
You should know better than to taunt Mars like that, Mark...
Oh, he does know how it works! So much genre savvyness brings a tear to my eye.
Also, nice character development on fireball.
On this one: that discoloration on the third Falcon is going to screw them hard. Most likely Equestria will come to the rescue sooner rather than later.
Somehow, monitoring your progress on the buffer is almost as suspenseful as reading about Whatney and Friends.
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Redundancy and fault tolerance in the avionics systems are as vital and indispensable as seatbelts and ESC are on modern day cars, the Proton-M was no exception. The cause for that launch failure was apparently because the technician responsible installed all three of them upside down.
As for how the system works on the Falcon 9, there are some good information and speculations on this Reddit thread.
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that would be fun to see.
but ya i can see a shit tone of game makers are trying to put DLC or easter eggs of them in there games now
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No, that was Sleipner 3
Agreeing with the folks saying don't worry yourself. We'll be here, if the chapters have to launch a little later because of QC concerns or what have you. Hell, I even have potatoes. We're good.
This chapter was, too. I can't say I'm too surprised by the outcome, but the description and the way reactions were handled gave it a strong touch.
I knew at least one would go boom. So far, it's not the one I expected. Now to see if #3 will go boom thanks to the odd coloration.
Pitching another voice on the 'don't worry about the buffer' track. We can handle a few days without updates, but you burning yourself out on the story trying to force daily updates would be far worse for both us as readers and you as the writer.
It's been an amazing ride so far, and I'd rather see the end a little later than not see it end at all.
...
Hm.
So, #2 worked, at least. Or at least went to space that day; we'll see if it makes it intact to the Martian surface.
But #1 went boom, and there's that odd patch in #3. And on Mars, things have been quiet lately...
Wonder how likely it is that Mars's malevolence can reach across a couple AUs and give a few critical rocket parts some little nudges?
Good luck with the writing!
Since you accidentally put up two chapters on 9 Feb, you’re actually a day ahead of schedule.
That said, don’t sweat the daily update pressure. The muse can be a fickle beast and often responds poorly to being forced. Don’t be afraid to take a few days off to recharge batteries if that’s what you need.
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Actually from what I read, Sleipnir 2 launched without incident and 3 is still in the works. So 50% success. I will say I was a little disappointed. Like the author made it too obvious that something was going to go wrong. I could have done without the "gut feeling" chapter.
To the author: just say if you can't keep going like this. I won't take offence and conventions are big time-sinks. Rather the output decline than the quality.
This was such an emotional chapter. Heart-in-mouth territory. Even though it was predictable just from the choice to describe the launch that it would go wrong, it was devastating when it did.
How soon can they get half a dozen more Sleipnirs built, for further resupply efforts?
You've given us 92 chapters with a consistency and speed that would put NASA and SpaceX both to shame, so you're in so much credit with reader goodwill that you could take six months off and we'd still be here.
Please don't take six months off
Writing should never be an obligation, but take as much time as you need, which you in particular have earned so many times over
Looks pretty similar (although failure happened substantially earlier here)
Sweet Celestia that was tense just reading it. Mark just had to tempt lady fate when he said things were going well in the last chapter didnt he?
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in real life? most space programs would probably have several redundancy's on there redundancies ready to go, in the martian universe? NASA is rather stupid in this regard.
here's hoping the changeling space program can compensate.
ARES III SOL 176
[8:59] JPL: Hello Mark. We've got some good news and some bad news. Since we're on a long delay, I'm going to go ahead and give them both to you. First, the good news. One of the first two resupply ships made it off the pad and in your direction without exploding. That brings us to the bad news. Yes, one of them blew up. Thankfully, it looks like you're going to get enough supplies to tide you over. There's just one minor issue. You see, due to space constraints, the second supply pod was filled with a food that we knew would keep well and that would grow on Mars. Yes, it is full of potatoes. All the way to the top. Over.
[9:30] JPL: Mark? Are you there? At least look at the calendar and reply.
10:05] WATNEY (Transmitted photo)
12:15] JPL: Mark, I'm not going to chastise you for your actions. Heck, when this is all over, I want to know *how* you managed to get a photo of your entire HAB mooning the camera on the surface of Mars....
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Hum. What *is* the Earth date in this story? They were scheduled before the abort to have Thanksgiving dinner after the abort, and it's been ~177 story-Earth days since the story started. (Which is about 2 written days per day.)
Anyone else remember that they put communications equipment on Slepnir 1 and 3, but not on 2? So if Slepnir 2 is the only one that makes it they still won't have a replacement radio. And Pathfinder will likely have burned out by the time it arrives.
No pressure on putting up new chapters; they're all great so we'll wait.
the problem with the broken wire and the gyro is said to have been the reason why the aircraft crashed in the South Atlantic? Apparently its the error return feed signal to the Magic 8 ball, and theres only one of them. Error wire tat is, so it has to work perfectly all the time with no noise or faults at all.
Just puzzled really, given how simple and effeective GPS style autocorrelating coding is, given the couple logic gates needd can be reconfigured from existing buffer circuitry so theres no extra points of fail, why it isnt liked. Even spread packet error correction is in the Full implementation of CD audio White book?
Hmm, needs more analysis on speed of reaction available verses speed of reaction possible, verses speed of reaction required? Curiocities Mars entry computer apparently rebooted twice due to program flow or sensor error or such. One was a soft reboot, taking 4 seconds. the other was either ahard reboot or a double reboot due to extended excession which was 12 seconds. Dedicated RTOS microkernal. Best Ive seen recently annonced by the forum guys is 7 second hard reboot, due to reintroducing beam tracing hyperspeed. Given a hard reboot checks the system ram, thats equivalent to a sub second hard boot on Curiocity. Theoretically.
Wonder if a printed phase array on a hydrogen met balloon could work as a useable antanna on Mars. very little excess boyuncy though.
just a real pity that even given all the experience building modular structures in orbit using remote robotic assembly that its still throw a fully working single object up in one go when they dont have massive overlift capability to do so. Like the Boeing SSTO or HARRP or Skylon etc.
How are the USA going to handle people managing to launch themselves to the ISS when they dont have a way to get back down? Given the Russian 6 hour intercepts? How little relative processing power is needed for that these days?
Great job once again. Good luck with the buffer. No pressure if you need to skip a few days to catch up, you do really high quality writing, it's worth waiting for. Keep up the good work!
Oh man, that was intense!
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I thank you for your correction.
8835212 Skylon will solve all our problems
About the story:
I hate when stuff like this happens. But even in my work I see that if something fails it always fails at the worst possible moment. I wish we would get some reacton from the ponies abouth the faild launch.
For the buffer:
Don't stress too much about it. But my thoughts on this are:
Rather post a 10 word chapter like: "Calling Hermes ... bzzzzz ... <connection lost>"
Just to keep your streak. While For us it would not matter if a day was missed or not, but for personal accomplishments, I know how I am affected if I lose my streak, so I hope you can just come up with a filler. In either case, kudos for making it so far.
Rockets fail and craftsmanship has its own problems. Look at the LEM in the Apollo Program. Seven years of design and construction and there were a hundred problems at delivery. As for the buffer. Take a week off, build it back up. We can wait with baited breath.
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Keep an eye on Rolls Royce, as they took out patents on a design that I suspect arose from the Pegasus engine used in the Harrier over 30 years ago, announced it as engines 40% more efficient over 10 years ago, and recently announced collaberation with two other companies for a new style of electric aircraft.
Imagine Skylon needing 40% less fuel to do its flightplan, or if one graph Ive seen is anywhere useable, capable of 3000 seconds impulse air breathing to Mach 10. The graph didnt go any further and the theoretical maximum for liquid hydrogen fuel is even higher.
Once you reach Mach 7, RP1, LOX will get you to orbit with lower mass ratio than a long range commercial jet.
You've posted 87 chapters and over 170,000 words since January under a metric fuckton of pressure from real life,and even the worst chapters are still a damned fine read. At this point, I don't think any of us would give you any shit if you had to slow it down or even take a break. We're here for the long haul.
Also, on a completely unrelated question: Has GlimGlam ever told Mark about these things called Timberwolves? Or zap apples? Or Poison Joke, or any of the other surreal, redonkulous, physics-raping magical plantlife of Equestria? Because I think his reaction would be absolutely priceless.
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"With everything else that was happening and with the limitations you and your guests were under, where did you find the time and energy to construct a gargantuan stone statue of a giant stone fist with an extended middle finger huge enough to be clearly and easily visible from low orbit without magnification? We aren't even mad, Mark. That's amazing."
Nobody expects you to be SS&E and even then if you look at his "early" dailies that was less than 2k words a day between them.
My suggestion is try to keep up but set aside 1 day a week where you do not post until you build back your buffer. Still write on those days because if you stop you'll struggle to get back into it but if you don't have issues with it or another day you've got a chance to work on it.
Alright where is rick sanchez when you need him? He would be able to cobble together a mini hypermatter reactor and a warp drive no problem as well as some kind of negative mass propulsion system or neutronium battery... Or just give them interdimensional cable... He would also probably get on watney's nerves
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Mm, fanfiction shouldn't have to interfere with your real life. No shame in setting aside some down time from it, especially since these are a pretty impressive length for daily updates.
Do what you gotta do to stay sane, man. No hard feelings.
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I'm not saying that is life needs it keep going. I'm saying that I know first hand that when you hit a rough patch writing daily and stop for a bit to "recover" it can be near impossible to get that going again.
I know you've got a challenge here for yourself you're trying to complete, but I don't think your fans would complain too bitterly if you took a week off for your sanity. :)
Take your time, we'll still be here.