Comment by BurningFrog

2 days ago

Thanks!

Still a weird naming scheme though. A rocket is not a new astronaut. Am I missing something clever?

6 comments

BurningFrog

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placardloop  2 days ago

Rockets aren’t birds either, and yet: Falcon 9 (the Falcon 9 also is the second iteration of the Falcon rockets, not the ninth, so…)

Rockets also aren’t planets, and yet: Saturn V

Rockets also aren’t mythological horse/man creatures, and yet: Vulcan Centaur

You’re overthinking it.

  • 0xffff2  2 days ago

    >(the Falcon 9 also is the second iteration of the Falcon rockets, not the ninth, so…)

    Falcon 9 has nine first stage engines, Falcon 1 had a single engine. It's not a version number.

    Edit: I had to look it up because Saturn 1 is not a single engine vehicle. It turns out that the Saturn V is design C-5 of the Saturn family of rockets, with A, B and C1-4 designs preceding it (not all designs where built), so the "V" in Saturn V is basically a version number, despite the Saturn V first stage having 5 engines

  • BurningFrog  2 days ago

    Side note:

    "Falcon" was almost certainly chosen so the BFR could be pronounced "Big Fucking Rocket", perhaps also influenced by the BFG in Doom/Quake.

    Also note how "SpaceX" is pronounced.

    • jjk166  2 days ago

      The "Falcon" name dates back to many years before the BFR concept. Then the BFR started out as "Big Fucking Rocket" and the F was retroactively changed to Falcon as a tongue in cheek way of keeping the acronym in respectable conversation. That said, BFR was always just a descriptive placeholder.

ttepasse  2 days ago

Back in the 2010s Blue Origin had a naming scheme after the pioneering flights of American astronauts:

The suborbital rocket New Shepard is named after Alan Shepard who was the first American astronaut and whose flight was a suborbital arc.

New Glenn is named after John Glenn whose first flight was the first orbital flight.

There was also talk of a New Armstrong rocket, although Neil Armstrong wasn’t the first American to "reach" the Moon. But then together with Buzz he was the first to land and the first to walk. I don’t know if New Armstrong's still getting developed.