MFlorida set a launch record last year. Now it's staring at a six-week gap.
CBrian Basson on X is calling it a rocket launch drought, and the numbers back it.
MLast Falcon 9 from the state was October twentieth, a Bandwagon 5 rideshare.
CAnd it's not weather, not a failure. SpaceX is pausing to build Starship infrastructure at Kennedy Space Center.
MSo the state that had a record one hundred nine launches now goes quiet for one company's retooling.
CIt's not going quiet. It's the cost of putting Starship on the pad at KSC.
MCall it a pause. But six weeks with no Florida launch matters to every satellite operator waiting on a slot.
CThe VP of launch was direct. Six weeks while they prepare. Transparent, planned, overdue.
MPlanned? A record year followed by a six-week hole is a planning problem, not a victory lap.
CWhat's the alternative? Fly Falcon forever because the cadence is comfortable?
MThe alternative is phasing the transition so the range doesn't go dark for six weeks.
CYou can't phase a launch tower and a giant mount. You shut down, you build, you fly a bigger rocket.
MThat all-or-nothing approach is exactly how you end up with a blank manifest.
CBlank manifest? It's six weeks, not six years. Florida had one hundred nine launches.
MAnd now zero for six weeks. That's a real hit to the launch economy.
CAnd ULA or Blue Origin aren't going to fill that gap overnight.
MExactly! So Florida's launch economy is tied to one company's schedule.
CYou say that like it's a scandal. It's called market leadership.
MIt's a vulnerability, Chris. A six-week shutdown shows how little slack there is.
COr how much capacity one company is adding. You keep skipping that part.
MI'm not against Starship. I'm against treating a six-week Florida shutdown like it's nothing.
CI never said it was nothing. I said it's the price of a bigger rocket at KSC.
MA commenter on X, Giuliani in orbit, made the sharper point: SpaceX will have to choose between NASA missions and Starlink or orbital data centers.
CThat's the real squeeze. Starship's payload priority isn't just Florida—it's whose cargo flies first.
MExactly. So this pause is a preview of harder schedule fights later.
CMaybe, but I'd rather fight over a bigger pie than protect a smaller one.
MSpoken like someone without a satellite sitting in a clean room.
CThe satellite will fly. And when Starship launches from KSC, the state's capacity jumps.
MFlorida's capacity was already record-setting. The drought is a choice, not a law of physics.
CIt's a good choice. And I stand by it.
MFine, I'll give you the long view. But the next operator stuck on the ground can call it a drought with my blessing.
CFair enough. Different world entirely: Hacker News is rediscovering a 2016 piece called "H.264 Is Magic."
MH.264? The video codec that's old enough to drink and still runs half the internet?
CThat's the one. The article walks through why the compression is genuinely wizardry.
MIt is clever. But a ten-year-old article trending says more about how little has replaced it.
CThat's the magic. We've had newer codecs for years, and H.264 is still the default for video.
MBecause swapping codecs across every phone, browser, and camera is misery. That's not magic; that's inertia.
CInertia with brilliant math underneath. I'll take it.
MIt still runs the video on your next flight or feed. That's enough.