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SpaceX’s drone ship fleet spied prepping for future rocket recoveries

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Just shy of three weeks since SpaceX’s last launch and the better part of half a year since the last successful ocean recovery, both of the company’s drone ships have been spotted in recent weeks being refurbished, refitted, and prepared for a return to the ocean.

The unusual drought of drone ship landings was nearly brought to an end in early March, but that recovery attempt – following the successful launch of Hispasat 30W-6 – was precluded by extreme weather in the landing zone, forcing booster 1044 to soft-land in the Atlantic with a swan call of landing legs and titanium grid fins. Several weeks before 1044’s demise, the inaugural launch of Falcon Heavy also saw the first failed booster recovery attempt since June 2016, ending a successful streak of 17 flawless Falcon 9 recoveries – though both side boosters did manage a spectacular, synchronized landing at LZs 1 and 2.

Before the Falcon Heavy attempt, East coast drone ship Of Course I Still Love You (OCISLY) successfully recovered a Falcon 9 booster for the last time in late October 2017, a handful of weeks after the successful recovery of SES-11 – the source of a small fire that famously destroyed SpaceX’s robotic stage securer, nicknamed Roomba or Octagrabber. Over the several months, since it was damaged, Octagrabber has gradually undergone refurbishment at SpaceX’s Port Canaveral berth, most recently appearing back on OCISLY for post-refurb testing.

With the introduction of Falcon 9 Block 5 presumably a month or less away, the days of expending once flight-proven boosters will almost certainly be over, aside from missions that truly require the booster’s full performance. As discussed yesterday, regardless of whether Block 5 is truly ready for the limelight, SpaceX is no more than two months away from effectively running out of all older boosters: the once-flown B1045 (TESS) will likely be the only flight-worthy heritage booster remaining by early May. In other words, every single SpaceX launch in the second half of 2018 is all but guaranteed to attempt recovery, either by land or sea.

OCISLY is effectively prepared to support these upcoming recovery attempts, and its Octagrabber may be as well. However, OCISLY was reportedly damaged by Falcon Heavy’s center core, despite the fact that it quite visibly missed the drone ship. Presumably, the forlorn booster acted as a sort of depth charge, thus damaging beyond repair the drone ship’s sensitive maneuvering and station-keeping thrusters. Before Falcon Heavy, it’s likely that the same fire that burned Octagrabber also damaged the hydraulic systems of one or several of OCISLY’s thrusters. These conclusions are supported by the fact that SpaceX’s West coast drone ship, Just Read The Instructions (JRTI), has visibly been stripped of its functional thrusters, presumably used to keep OCISLY operational in anticipation of Falcon Heavy and later Hispasat 30W-6.

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Mr Steven, SpaceX’s only current fairing recovery vessel, has also been spotted conducting some sort of sea trials just off the shore of Port of San Pedro and LA, presumably honing recovery operations and giving its pilots time to practice catching fairings. Following the launch of PAZ and SpaceX’s own prototype Starlink satellites, the company managed its first-ever intact fairing recovery, although it missed Mr Steven’s net by a few hundred feet. As stated by Musk, it should be relatively easy to go from missing by a few hundred feet to successfully catching the fairing, and it’s likely that the imminent launch of Iridium-5 (7:19 am PDT, March 29) will attempt to close that gap and actually catch a fairing halve. On the other hand, the booster – flight-proven during the October 2017 launch of Iridium-3 – will likely soft-land in the Pacific Ocean because JRTI is currently unable to support ocean recoveries, lacking two of its four thrusters.

Follow us for live updates, behind-the-scenes sneak peeks, and a sea of beautiful photos from our East and West coast photographers.

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Eric Ralph is Teslarati's senior spaceflight reporter and has been covering the industry in some capacity for almost half a decade, largely spurred in 2016 by a trip to Mexico to watch Elon Musk reveal SpaceX's plans for Mars in person. Aside from spreading interest and excitement about spaceflight far and wide, his primary goal is to cover humanity's ongoing efforts to expand beyond Earth to the Moon, Mars, and elsewhere.

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Tesla named official AV operator in Austin ahead of robotaxi launch

Tesla robotaxis could begin operating around Austin any day now, as echoed by an update to the city’s website.

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Just as Tesla prepares to launch its own commercial robotaxi services in Austin, Texas this month, the company has now appeared on the state’s website as an official operator of autonomous vehicles (AVs).

As of Monday, Tesla has been listed as an AV operator on Austin’s official Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) site, ahead of the company’s expected launch of the long-awaited service sometime this month. The news, which X user Tesla Yoda first spotted, precedes some reports suggesting the robotaxi service could launch in the coming days, and it comes as the city becomes an increasingly competitive stomping ground for the emerging technology.

Although Tesla has been included on the list, the website says that Tesla is still in the testing phase, alongside most of the other AV operators in the city. At this time, Alphabet-owned robotaxi company Waymo is the only operator listed as being in the deployment phase, while Hyundai-owned company Motional is listed as being in the mapping phase.

Tesla is set to initially deploy the service as a limited pilot program using the company’s existing Model Y vehicles, and it will start by testing them in the safest areas of the city within geo-mapped boundaries as extra safety precautions upon launch.

Below you can see the full list of AV operators on the Austin DMV website at the time of writing, including both the Alphabet-owned Waymo and the Amazon-run Zoox.

Current list of AV operators in Austin

  • ADMT
    • Phase: testing
    • Parent company: VW
  • AVRide
    • Phase: testing
    • Parent company: AVRide Inc
  • Motional
    • Phase: mapping
    • Parent company: Hyundai
  • Waymo
    • Phase: deployment
    • Parent company: Alphabet (Google)
  • Tesla
    • Phase: testing
    • Parent company: Tesla
  • Zoox
    • Phase: testing
    • Parent company: Amazon

READ MORE ON AUTONOMOUS VEHICLES: Elon Musk just revealed more about Tesla’s June Robotaxi launch

Tesla’s Austin robotaxi launch, Full Self-Driving, and other AV companies

The news follows a report from Bloomberg a few weeks ago saying that Tesla was considering a launch date of June 12 for the service, though the validity of that report is still unclear. Additionally, Tesla could still change its plans on a launch date, though the company’s inclusion on the Austin DMV AV operators list appears to be a good sign either way.

The company has also been running internal pilot programs for the robotaxi service in Austin and around the Bay Area, California, with around 300 test operators operating the vehicles in the Texas city since at least April. Last fall, CEO Elon Musk also said that employees had already been piloting a ride-hailing program around the Bay.

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Tesla has long touted its Full Self-Driving (FSD) program as the solution to autonomy, with the system utilizing cameras and real-time driver footage to train its AI neural network on how to drive. By comparison, most other companies utilize cameras and radar systems together, while relying on geo-mapped systems to determine where the robotaxi can operate.

Waymo launched driverless ride-hailing services in Austin through a partnership with Uber, though the company has also been running paid robotaxi rides in various parts of California since last year through its Waymo One app. Other companies such as the Amazon-owned firm Zoox and the Hyundai-led company Motional are also preparing to deploy services in Austin and other U.S. cities.

Tesla’s ‘Project Alicorn’ and what it means for the Robotaxi platform

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I took a Tesla Cybertruck weekend Demo Drive – Here’s what I learned

I had a Cybertruck for 48 hours thanks to Tesla, and here’s what I thought about it.

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Tesla was kind enough to offer me a Cybertruck ‘Beast’ for an entire weekend after the company started offering 48-hour test drives of the vehicles across its lineup. I got a call from my local showroom asking if I would like to partake in a weekend of fun with perhaps the coolest truck around, and of course, I said yes.

It was a little different from past weekend Demo Drives in the sense that I picked up the Cybertruck in the morning on Saturday instead of the evening, when the showroom would be closed, and I would have to have it back at open time on Monday. I had my full Saturday with it; I took it for a round of golf, I took it to dinner with my Fiancè and parents, and it truly gave me a full-fledged feel of what it would be like to own one.

There were a lot of things I liked, and there were a handful of things I’d like to change. I’ll go through all of those in this article:

First Impressions

This was the second time I had ever driven Cybertruck, with the first being at early Demo Drives last August when I drove to West Chester, PA.

I picked it up at 10 am on Saturday morning, and the team at Tesla Mechanicsburg had me in and out in less than five minutes. I grabbed my paperwork and was on my way, and I took my best friend with me as he had never been in one. He was never a fan of the Cybertruck’s look, but could not deny the interior’s clean and minimalistic appearance.

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This Cyberbeast was in terrific shape. I do wish the inside was vacuumed, the windshield was cleaned, and the wiper fluid reservoir was full, but these were all things I took care of myself after I got home. I would love to know how some Cybertruck owners clean their windshields, as I could get most, but not all. The bottom portion remained a tad smudged-up, but it was nothing unusual.

It was fun to pull into my local diner near my house, and about 45 minutes away from the Mechanicsburg showroom, to see all of the people nearby turn their heads just to get a look at this thing. Of course, I knew it would be soon that I’d get some middle fingers, but for now, it was all friendly. Smiles, waves, and fun. It was genuinely a fun experience.

My Weekend in the Cybertruck

First things first, I had an afternoon tee time with some buddies of mine who did not know that I was getting the Cybertruck for the weekend. They were all surprised to see it, to say the least!

They had never been inside one, and did mention that the interior was just plain awesome. The glass ceiling was among their favorite features of the Cybertruck, but conditioning the cabin to be nice and cool as we finished up on the 18th was awesome too. Their cars do start remotely, but do not feature adjustable climate settings.

This kept me cool on my entire ride home, and is something all Teslas feature. It’s among the best little additions, especially as the Summer months approach.

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A reader and follower told me to throw my clubs in the frunk next time. I will do that.

After golf, it was time to pick my Fiancè up from the house and my parents as well, where we drove about an hour to Hampstead, Maryland, for a nice dinner to celebrate my better-half’s graduation from nursing school. My parents were truly blown away by the Model Y a few weekends ago, so this was what I was really looking forward to for them, because their reaction is genuinely so exciting.

My favorite thing about driving this truck was the positive reactions I got from many. I got a lot of waves, a lot of people wanting me to honk the horn, one of my neighbors even said, “Do you mind if I look inside of it?” I showed him all the cool features like the tonneau, the power frunk, and the size of everything.

Of course, I also had a handful of people who made their feelings about the car very apparent with a quick fling of the middle finger toward me as I drove by. I never understood flicking people off over a car: maybe how they drive, or maybe if they have a weird bumper sticker. I wasn’t around any of the middle finger-givers long enough for them to assess my driving, and the Cybertruck was void of any stickers or decals.

Oh well.

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Sunday was a lengthy, 300-or-so-mile drive from my house to the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, PA. I try to go twice a year to pay my respects to the heroes, but I also saw it as a good time to test the range, experience Supercharging, see how the Cybertruck handled a longer day, and see how I felt in the car after the drive.

My first Supercharging stop was in Fort Littleton, PA, where v4 Supercharger stalls were placed in what was very obviously a small, rural, and predominantly blue-collar town. It was pretty fun to see a Supercharger in such a rural area. I had great speeds, as you can see, and we topped out at upwards of 330 kW.

It was nice to sit there and feel what charging would be like as opposed to driving a gas car and having a quick stop at a gas station. I’ll be honest: it’s not at all what a gas station experience is like, which is quick, painless, and easy. However, stopping for ~20 minutes to grab some mileage was also a nice break from the drive. It let me take a few minutes to wind down because the weather was awful, and driving in the rain is never super fun.

This was one of two charging stops, the other being in Breezewood, PA, using V3 Superchargers. This was a stop that was more congested than the Fort Littleton charger, but there was much more to offer, like a Dunkin Donuts, a pizza shop, and even a Starbucks down below. It was a quick stop, but the charging experience was very sound. I would say that if you are someone who wants to get from Point A to Point B as fast as possible, the charging experience might not be for you.

I tend to be one of those people, but I didn’t feel like it disrupted my drive or ruined anything. There was plenty to do, and it was 20 minutes maximum before I was back on the road and heading back to my destination, whether it was the Memorial or home.

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Why I Didn’t Use Full Self-Driving

I didn’t use Full Self-Driving at all during my weekend with the Cybertruck. There are two reasons for this.

The first is that I know what FSD is capable of. I know it’s great, and I know I love it. This weekend was a very quick one, and my time with the car was limited. I wanted to have as much hands-on experience with the Steer-by-Wire and four-wheel steering as I could. I had an extremely fast and powerful vehicle that was faster than anything I’ve ever had the pleasure of driving. I wanted to have fun with it.

The second was that I genuinely LOVED driving the Cybertruck. I will admit, I think I am one of those people who is not in love with driving, so I was really happy to have a car that made me want to drive.

My Final Thoughts

Share this article so I can afford to buy one. Just kidding (or am I?).

It was genuinely one of my favorite weekends in recent memory. I really loved a lot about the truck. It was fast, it was fun to drive, and it is a high-tech car. It’s never fun going back to my car when I have to drop off whatever Tesla I have for the weekend back at the showroom.

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X launches Community Notes feature to bridge diverse perspectives

X’s new pilot expands Community Notes by spotlighting posts liked across ideological divides. Can social media finally bring people together?

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(Credit: Community Notes/X)

X’s Community Notes pilot seeks to bridge perspectives by introducing an experimental feature to identify posts liked by diverse viewpoints. Announced by Elon Musk’s X, the initiative builds on the success of Community Notes, which highlights agreement among users who typically disagree.

Starting June 05, a select group of Community Notes contributors, representing a broad spectrum of perspectives, will encounter a new callout within the platform. “The callout shows based on early and limited Like signals on the post,” X explained.

Contributors can rate and provide feedback on these posts, aiding the development of an open-source algorithm to identify content that resonates across differing viewpoints. The pilot aims to uncover ideas, insights, and opinions that foster unity, addressing the often-divided nature of online discourse.

“People often feel the world is divided, yet Community Notes shows people can agree, even on contentious topics,” X noted. The new feature builds on years of user requests to extend Community Notes’ approach to posts, recognizing those liked by people who would normally disagree. By highlighting such content, X hopes to motivate users to share ideas that resonate broadly, potentially driving meaningful dialogue.

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The pilot follows X’s transparent development process, similar to how Community Notes was refined. “Following the path we used to develop Community Notes, we’re building in public with a small pilot so that this concept can be shaped by the people,” X stated. The initiative will rely on contributor feedback to iterate and refine the algorithm, ensuring it effectively identifies posts that bridge perspectives.

This experimental feature underscores X’s commitment to fostering constructive online conversations. By leveraging early “Like” signals and contributor input, X aims to amplify content that transcends ideological divides.

“Ultimately, it could help move the world forward in ways that the people want,” X added, emphasizing the potential for this tool to promote unity and understanding.

As X rolls out this pilot, the platform invites its community to shape its evolution, much like the iterative process that has made Community Notes a hallmark of collaborative fact-checking. The initiative could redefine how social media platforms highlight shared values, paving the way for more inclusive and impactful discussions.

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