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Requested move 1 February 2020

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved - clear consensus against (closed by non-admin page mover) DannyS712 (talk) 02:16, 11 February 2020 (UTC)


List of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches → List of SpaceX rocket launches – Proposing a scope change to focus on all of SpaceX rocket launches, rather than just the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches. I also suggest to merge the Falcon 1#Launch manifest and List_of_Starship_flights#Proposed_orbital_flights into this article. Pinging @PhilipTerryGraham, Fcrary, Insertcleverphrasehere, Mfb, N2e, OkayKenji, and Rowan Forest:. Soumyabrata (talk • subpages) 11:27, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

@Soumya-8974: I guess in this case the concern would now be whether there'd be a consensus to start making lists of rocket launches by operator, and I don't really see the point in that when the existing lists of rocket launches by launch vehicle/launch vehicle families are adequate. – PhilipTerryGraham (talk · articles · reviews) 08:45, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose do we really need yet another discussion? This has been proposed in one way or another many times and was always strongly opposed. --mfb (talk) 13:31, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
@Mfb: This is not an argument against the move proposal and more a complaint about the discussion. This is not productive. – PhilipTerryGraham (talk · articles · reviews) 08:45, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
You can find all these arguments in previous discussions, including my comments. No point in repeating all that yet another time. --mfb (talk) 11:01, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose - while Falcon 9 and Heavy are closely releatet and should be in one List, the other Rockets, like Falcon 1, BFR and possible fututre ones, are different ans should have their own lists. Gial Ackbar (talk) 13:34, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
    The list article will not list any canceled flights, which of them are already mentioned on the individual article. --Soumyabrata (talk • subpages) 15:57, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
    That is not my concern here. But that future orbital launches of a compltly differnt rocket would be inclouded in this list. Gial Ackbar (talk) 16:43, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Support. It makes no sense to keep the Falcon 1 flights separate from Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy. It's clearly the same rocket family, and keeping them separate makes this list inconsistent with all other launch lists: List of Ariane launches, List of Atlas launches, List of Thor and Delta launches, List of Soyuz missions, and List of Proton launches. Size considerations don't apply either, as there were only five Falcon 1 launches. I'm not so sure about including Starship launches, though, it's a very different rocket. Tercer (talk) 17:39, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
    I'm in favor of splitting them up, actually, because these lists mix very different rockets. Want to find out how often Delta IV Heavy launched in the last years? You have to scroll through all the Delta II launches, or vice versa. It would be a lot of work so I didn't formally propose that. --mfb (talk) 04:22, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
    That's bold, arguing to change five (six, actually, with List of Long March launches) other lists in order to conform to the only one that's inconsistent. You know that it would never be accepted. Everybody else seem to be familiar with the concept of a rocket family. Only the editors of this list have a problem with it. Tercer (talk) 07:50, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
    You really have a habit of misrepresenting my comments in the weirdest ways. Did I suggest doing so for consistency? No, I suggested it purely based on the lists themselves. Consistency would be a nice extra feature but not the main reason. Everyone is familiar with the concept of a rocket family, but that doesn't mean we have to make launch lists by family. Following the same discussion style, I could (but do not) say that you are not familiar with the concept of individual rockets. See how silly that is? --mfb (talk) 11:01, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
    It would be more productive if you focussed on the matter at hand instead of making personal attacks. Tercer (talk) 15:08, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
    If you misrepresent my comments I will point out that you do so. Stop misrepresenting my comments if you can't deal with that. In fact, it would be generally useful if you don't misrepresent my comments all the time. Most of my previous comment was on topic by the way. --mfb (talk) 16:00, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
    I honestly thought your argument was about consistency. What is your argument then? Tercer (talk) 17:51, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
    See above: "because these lists mix very different rockets. Want to find out how often Delta IV Heavy launched in the last years? You have to scroll through all the Delta II launches, or vice versa." How anyone could interpret "consistency with other lists" into that is beyond my understanding. --mfb (talk) 13:59, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
    WP:PA is not optional, it is Wikipedia policy. It is really grating to talk to you, every answer I get is an insult. Tercer (talk) 15:28, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose This has been discussed before. The Falcon 9 family and the Falcon 1 are fundamentally different architectures. Tercer The only thing similar about them is the name. Also the proposed name would have issues once Starship launches become routine. That vehicle has nothing to do at all with the Falcon 9 family. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 18:02, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
I don't think having been discussed before is a valid reason to oppose the move. On the contrary, the very fact that a move has been proposed again and again by different people is strong evidence that the title of the page is unsatisfactory. In the archives I could find one proposal by SS49, one by Keavon, one by Insertcleverphrasehere, and one by Natural RX.
And no, you know very well that they have much more in common than the name. Falcon 9 was a direct evolution of Falcon 1, both are single-stick kerolox rockets using the Merlin engine, with solid rocket boosters. In fact, their difference is much smaller than the difference between the Ariane 1 and Ariane 5, or the difference between the Atlas A and the Atlas V, or between the Delta A and the Delta IV. Tercer (talk) 19:47, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
Tercer, Stop twisting my words. I’m merely pointing out that this has been opposed before; not opposing it on those grounds. Anyway, the reasons for opposing are still valid. They share an engine, sort of (the Merlin engine actually changed quite a but between the rockets). And anyway they share pretty much nothing else; it was not a ‘direct evolution’ and I “know very well” NOTHING of the sort. Do not put words in my mouth. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 21:39, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
I'm pointing out that you're being disingenuous. I know that you know that they share the Merlin engine (which also evolved a lot between Falcon 9 versions). The point stands, they are much more similar than the rockets I pointed out that are in the same list. Tercer (talk) 22:15, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
Tercer, I don't accept your argument based off other lists. The history of development for those rocket families are each complex and have each been justified on a case by case basis. Anyway, WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 23:48, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
That's just an essay. The actual Wikipedia policy is WP:TITLECON. You need a reason to break consistency, but you have given none. Why should the Falcon rocket family be the only one treated differently? Tercer (talk) 07:41, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
Tercer, As I’ve said. The scope for each of these was chosen on a case by case basis for each rocket family based on very different development histories. That is my reason. Anyway; consistency in titling does NOT mandate us to chose a specific *scope* of other similar lists. Stop trying to be a wikilawyer. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 09:16, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
You still haven't given a single argument about why should the Falcon rocket family be treated differently than every other rocket family. Tercer (talk) 15:10, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
Tercer, I have repeatedly, you seem to be unable to read my comments. I won't be interacting with you any more in this discussion. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 18:03, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
If that were true it wouldn't be hard to quote yourself, would it? You haven't given any argument. Ignoring me is just childish behaviour. Tercer (talk) 18:24, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
Tercer, If I have to beat you over the head with it: Each of the rocket families listed is different, has a different history, which has resulted in editors choosing a different scope, which has resulted in different types of titles. This is why this article should be treated differently. WP:TITLECON only applies to title styling it does not mandate us to try to make the scope of one list match the scope of other lists. The scope of this list was chosen as it is because most editors prefer it that way. There are no guidelines or policies that require us to do otherwise. Full stop. We are not required to change the scope of this article because WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS.
I personally prefer the scope to remain the way it is because I consider the Falcon 1 is a very different rocket from the Falcon 9; reusability and rocket landings being a major consideration and difference that hasn't been mentioned. Additionally; Falcon 1 does not fit into any of the stats graphs we currently have, nor would it make sense with the prose sections we currently have. This requested move (read: title change) is really a requested change of scope (read: content change). People are rejecting the content change part of this RM, and no amount of article title consistency arguments are valid against editors preferring that the content and scope of this article stay separate from, and exclusive of, the Falcon 1 and Starship. Does that make me clear??? — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 20:48, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
Indeed, you said all that before. What I'm asking is why should the Falcon rocket family be treated differently than all other rocket families. This is what you haven't answered.
Ok, policy doesn't mandate consistency in scope. Fair enough. Consistency in scope is nice to have, anyway, and the fact that everyone else made a different decision perhaps should be taken into account.
Actually, reusability is not a difference between Falcon 1 and Falcon 9. Falcon 1 was also planned to be reused, and in all its launches SpaceX attempted exactly the same parachute recovery that also failed in the first two launches of Falcon 9. Tercer (talk) 21:13, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
Tercer, "I personally prefer the scope to remain the way it is because I consider the Falcon 1 is a very different rocket from the Falcon 9; reusability and rocket landings being a major consideration and difference that hasn't been mentioned. Additionally; Falcon 1 does not fit into any of the stats graphs we currently have, nor would it make sense with the prose sections we currently have". — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 21:15, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
How does Falcon 1 not fit in the stats graphs? All of them apply. Tercer (talk) 21:17, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
Tercer, "I personally prefer the scope to remain the way it is because I consider the Falcon 1 is a very different rocket from the Falcon 9... Additionally; Falcon 1 does not fit into any of the stats graphs we currently have, nor would it make sense with the prose sections we currently have[, nor do I believe that it would be an improvement to add it to these]". — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 21:27, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
Now you're just being childish. How does it not fit in the stats graphs? Tercer (talk) 21:36, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
Tercer, Because they are different enough that I don't think they should. Stop being obtuse and respect the fact that I have an opinion that is different from yours. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 22:10, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
I'm not being obtuse, I'm trying to understand what are you talking about. So it does fit in the stats graphs? Tercer (talk) 22:14, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
Tercer, I think it is clear that no matter how much I explain this you will come back with "But Whhhhhhhy?" *in my head this sounds like a winy child's voice*. I will agree to disagree. Now stop messaging me. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 22:20, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
You didn't explain at all what is the problem you have with the graphs. In any cases, it is clear that you're not interested in a serious discussion, I will indeed stop messaging you. Tercer (talk) 22:26, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
I would suggest moving Falcon 1 rocket launches—because there were so few of them, it will take minimal space—and call this "List of Falcon rocket launches". Or, rename this "List of Falcon 9 rocket launches" and redirect "List of Falcon Heavy rocket launches" here, with the implicit assumption that FH is a part of F9. I agree the current name is unwieldy, but scoping it to the entire set of SpaceX launches, especially with Starship/Super Heavy on the horizon (and Starhopper plus other development flights in the medium term), would be far too broad. We may one day need to even break these on by decade like the Atlas and Delta families. I Oppose the current proposal.Keavon (talk) 20:29, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
Indeed, that would make more sense. I would name it "List of Falcon launches", though, for consistency with the other lists. Tercer (talk) 20:41, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose totally different rockets--Dwalin (talk) 18:43, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose as discussed before. crandles (talk) 22:12, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose, vastly different launch vehicle architectures with vastly different engines. Moreover, Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy have already achieved some 70 launches, making this rocket design one of the most flown rockets of all time. Chaers. N2e (talk) 02:42, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Comment: Soumyabrata, it seems clear that your move proposal has very little support. Perhaps you could change it to propose instead a move to "List of Falcon rocket launches" or "List of Falcon launches"? That would have greater support. Tercer (talk) 15:15, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose I might be open to including Falcon 1, but Starship is a different vehicle and including Starship on this page would make it too long.has been addressed above OkayKenji (talk page) 19:55, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose, I feel like we need a ban on this discussion because we have this pointless discussion every 3 months. People give the same argument like a broken record player now. There is no list of ULA launches, no list of ArianeSpace launches and no list of Norhtrop Grumman launches. Not happening and I really think we need to put at the top of the talk page a 2 year ban on this discussion. If people want a change it's just going to be all opposed because people are sick of it. AndrewRG10 (talk) 23:49, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose I especially would not want to see an effort to incorporate Starship test flights into this list. Eleuther (talk) 10:05, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose I would be in favor of adding the Falcon 1 launches to a "List of Falcon (Rocket Family) Launches", but I strongly oppose adding Starship or future SpaceX rockets to this list. AmigaClone (talk) 12:07, 7 February 2020 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Denoting crewed flights

It seems someone took it upon themselves to denote crewed flights with a background color and a smiley face. ☺ 74.192.165.136 (talk) 23:14, 13 November 2019 (UTC)

Has been removed. The list of R-7 Launches, Long March, Titan and Atlas family do not have a colour scheme. There is nothing special about the Falcon 9 to make note about crewed flights. If we think we should colour scheme all manned flights across Wikipedia, lets do the discussion here. AndrewRG10 (talk) 23:31, 13 November 2019 (UTC)
Smiley face looks like joke/vandalism. So I think a stick man/astronaut would be better than smiley if we are going to do this. No real objection to a colour scheme. Maybe a stick man would be enough. crandles (talk) 23:46, 13 November 2019 (UTC)
I agree: The Falcon 9 is the same vehicle whether or not there are astronauts onboard. If we wanted to distinguish between different configurations, it would make more sense to mark all Dragon flights (cargo included), since they don't use a payload faring. But I don't think even that would be a good idea. Fcrary (talk) 23:52, 13 November 2019 (UTC)
Crewed flights are special - not so much from an engineering point of view, but from the way the flight is perceived. I don't think we need a color, especially not such a prominent one, but I support something that makes them easy to spot. --mfb (talk) 11:01, 27 November 2019 (UTC)
Crewed flight boosters have a far more stringent checkup from NASA than non-NASA boosters. It is probably similar to Dragon1 booster checkup. Only three nations have put people on a rocket, and only a small percentage of their rockets were rated/used for manned flights. Even SpaceX might have more FH launches than manned launches for the foreseeable future, so I don't get why not highlight those. Also, wikicode doesn't seem to have stickman characters. 2601:602:9200:1310:2CB7:9F7E:7895:FCF8 (talk) 20:49, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
Again, Wikipedia does not highlight those human spaceflight launches of any other launch vehicle. If we do so for Falcon 9, we'd need to do it for Atlas, Stature, Soyuz, Long March, etc. for the sake of consistency. If you think we should do that, then it needs to be discussed in a broader form than this talk page.
I generally like the idea of something like that, but yes there needs to be a broader discussion so that we can maintain WP:CONSISTENCY if possible. That being said, there is nothing that stops us adding it here if there is a local consensus for it and the users who edit those other pages object to adding it there. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 19:37, 1 December 2019 (UTC)

So where is that discussion happening? I am assuming this is as good as any other place considering it's getting more views than most WP places or other similar lists. 4.35.246.19 (talk) 22:26, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

Hard to find a good symbol to denote crewed flights. Miscellaneous Symbols. OkayKenji (talk page) 04:49, 13 January 2020 (UTC)
That's BS. Look at this edit by an "established" editor that went on to undo constructive edits without even bothering to start a discussion on the talkpage. Months have passed since then and this debate has died down because of overzealous "established" editors. ☺☺☺ 205.175.106.197 (talk) 19:49, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

Sticky at the top of the talk page a link to all the discussions about moving the page to include Falcon 1

I think everyone can agree this is getting discussed far too often and is becoming an annoyance. Because past discussions get archived, I feel we need a stickied note at the top linking all discussions and a request to not bring it up for the next 1-2 years. In 18 months or so people will be more willing to talk about a change. It'll still not happen but I feel a lot of opposes now are just people getting really annoyed at this repeated discussion. - AndrewRG10 (talk| 21:54 2 February 2020

  • The fact that this discussion recurs so often is strong evidence that the title (and scope) is not satisfactory. Instead of banning discussion perhaps you could try to find a title (and scope) people are happy with? Tercer (talk) 21:56, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
    Wikipedia likes to run by democracy. And if we look in past discussions how much of a land slide this discussion loses in. Yes some people aren't happy, but they're a small minority. The majority does not want a change and are also getting tired of having to say no. AndrewRG10 (talk) 22:00, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
    Actually Wikipedia runs by consensus. Tercer (talk) 22:02, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
    Tercer, For decisions not based on policy consensus is pretty much based on number of people supporting/opposed (e.g. where the choice is up to editor preference; like the choice of what scope this list should have). Note that consensus is WP:NOTUNANIMITY. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 22:13, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
    No, it's not. In any case, consensus is needed to accept the move proposal, not to reject it, so I don't know why you're wikilawyering here. I'm just giving AndrewRG10 advice. You clearly have a problem here, and banning discussion won't solve it. It will merely stop move requests while the ban lasts, after which they will certainly resume. Tercer (talk) 22:23, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
    Tercer, I never proposed banning discussion. I personally think we are a ways away from needing that, but it does happen when something gets perennial and keeps getting shot down (for examples, see Talk:Stanley Kubrick and Talk:Genesis creation narrative). — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 23:14, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
    Both are good examples of changes that should have been made but didn't because the editors were so dogmatic. Instead discussion was banned and the articles got stuck in an unsatisfactory state. Much better would be to actually solve the problem, instead of kicking the can down the road. Tercer (talk) 10:07, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
    Tercer, yeah... but people tried that. Lots of times. You can't force others to change their opinions. The editors on those pages have heard all the arguments; they simply don't agree with them. When you end up with that sort of position, it is sometimes best that the stick gets dropped permanently or at least somewhere that it won't get picked up for a good long time. As I've said, I don't think it applies to this page... not yet anyway. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 19:09, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
    I'm just saying that both these pages are good examples of what not to do. The editors just dug down their trenches, refused to discuss or compromise, and ensured that the problem won't ever be solved. Tercer (talk) 19:19, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
    Exactly, no one wants to compromise because they're sick of having to say their argument every 3 months. People will be less likely to do this discussion so often because of that. Stopping discussing will let people rest so when the discussion comes up next time, people will be ok with talking because they don't have to repeat their stance so often. And no, there is not a problem. It is a small minority who want to make this page completely different to other lists of launch lists by including different class of rockets in here. The only thing people need to do is look back at past discussions on this topic and see why it doesn't happen. And the best way to make sure people know there have been past discussions is by stickying something on top so people know not to bring it up. - AndrewRG10 (talk) 21:06, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
    What? No, the argument is precisely the opposite, the proposals were precisely about making this list similar to the other lists by including the whole rocket family. This list is the only that excludes one of the rockets in the family (this particular proposal was about making the list about SpaceX instead of the Falcon rocket family, but nobody supported that).
    If you look at the examples that Insertcleverphrasehere quoted, you'll see that banning discussion didn't help. People were still unwilling to talk about it after the ban expired, and the problem stayed unsolved. Tercer (talk) 22:27, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
    Tercer, I think the issue here is that others on this page don't consider the Falcon 1 to be part of the same rocket family as the Falcon 9. There is no article on the "Falcon rocket family" for example; the closest we do have, SpaceX launch vehicles, refers to the "SpaceX's first launch vehicle family, the Falcon 1..." and makes no allusions to them sharing a family. Nothing in Falcon 1 or Falcon 9 implies that they share a 'family' either. I'd hazard a guess that most of the editors in these articles don't consider them part of the same family, despite the name and shared engine/fuel. On the other hand, the link between the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy is much more clear, and the Falcon Heavy is described as a derivative of the Falcon 9 in both the Falcon 9 article, as well as the Falcon Heavy article. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 22:40, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
    I'm really having trouble with WP:AGF here. You know very well that Falcon (rocket family) has just been moved to SpaceX launch vehicles, because you were part of the discussions. And the reason it was moved it was because editors were annoyed with the frequent move requests in this list. I guess you decided then that the solution is to pretend that the Falcon rocket family does not exist. Tercer (talk) 00:04, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
    Tercer, Well, I actually wasn't a part of that specific RM (despite having been pinged), but was part of other discussion on the page before and after so I can see how you would think I would know the history of that page in detail. Honestly 5 months ago I was mostly inactive on wiki and only showed up sporadically and forgot that there was a move there.
    In any case, my comment is just as valid, since the RM, subsequent scope change, and other discussions on that page prove my point even more: editors in general don't consider the Falcon 1 to be part of the same rocket family as the Falcon 9. We are not the only ones that treat the Falcon 9 as a family of its own either: Gunter's page lists them separately as well [1] [2] (Note that the heavy is considered part of the falcon 9 family) , with no mention on either page of a larger 'falcon family'. If we changed the name of the aforementioned article, it wasn't to 'pretend' that the "falcon rocket family" never existed, it was to correctly represent the fact that editors and sources alike don't consider it to be a single rocket family. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 02:19, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
    On the contrary, the RM shows that you decided to indulge in the fantasy that the Falcon rocket family doesn't exist because you didn't want to include Falcon 1 in this list. You were not zealous enough in purging Wikipedia of references to the Falcon family, though. SpaceX launch vehicles is still in the "Rocket families" category, and the "Rocket families" template lists "SpaceX" as one, with the hilarious implications that "SpaceX" is somehow a rocket family, and that Falcon 1 and Starship belong to the same family. Tercer (talk) 08:28, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
    Tercer, I think you'll find that I've edited that talk page three times, and that I didn't show up until well after the first proposal was in progress (I didn't even know that page existed until I was pinged by Phillip). I didn't even bother voting in the subsequent RM! I find it kinda crazy that you think I am part of some cabal against the Falcon 1. Look through the archives of this page; you'll find that I once proposed adding the Falcon 1 to this page. I was convinced by the cogent arguments of others. At this point adding Falcon 1 would be adding a third wheel to a motorcycle. That's my opinion anyway.
    In any case, thanks for pointing out that oversight with the categories. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 09:20, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
    Yes, that is pretty much what happened. You (singular) proposed to add Falcon 1 here, then changed your mind. Afterwards you (plural) decided to remove any reference to the Falcon family from Wikipedia to pretend that this makes sense. How are the categories now, then? The concept of "rocket family" doesn't apply to SpaceX anymore? Or do we have a "Falcon 9" family, which includes the Heavy, a "Starship" family (as it will have several variants in the future), with the Falcon 1 not belonging to any family? I do wonder whether you would try to defend this nonsense if the Falcon 1e and Falcon 5 had flown. Tercer (talk) 10:54, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
    Tercer, You are making a lot of assertions about what I did and my motivations behind it and it's pissing me off a bit. I didn't invent this idea, nor was I the one that changed the articles. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 19:38, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
    This was explicitly the motivation behind the move proposal, which you supported. Besides, I can't conceive of a different motivation for defending the ludicrous idea that the Falcons are somehow not a rocket family. Tercer (talk) 21:57, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

You "can't conceive" why someone is defending a "ludicrous idea." Well, apparently you're the only one who thinks it is "ludicrous", and Wikipedia is not about what one single editor can and can not conceive. Under the circumstances, you might want to consider the possibility that maybe, just maybe, you're missing something. And stop arguing about it incessantly. Fcrary (talk) 23:48, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

It's a bit counterproductive to come argue with me if your goal is for me to stop arguing, don't you think? Yes, I did consider the possibility that I was missing something, and repeatedly asked mfb and Insertcleverphrasehere what was different about the Falcon rocket family, but I got only insults in reply. The idea is ludicrous, because for all other rocket families the criterion is simply how the manufacturer decided to name the rockets. The argument that Falcon 1 is "very different" doesn't hold water, as the differences between the rockets in other rocket families are much larger than the differences between Falcon 1 and Falcon 9. Moreover, nobody went to the other "rocket family" articles and started separating them based on which rockets they judge to be too different. Tercer (talk) 07:32, 6 February 2020 (UTC)
Tercer, Even if we take the 'rocket family' definition to be merely based on the manufacturer's naming convention, nothing obligates us to jam all their launches together into one list just to satisfy some arbitrary desire for consistency amongst all the rocket launch lists. On the contrary, the list of Falcon 1 launches fits much better at Falcon 1 and this page is much more cohesive without them. This is a Featured List (I believe it is the only featured list among rocketry launches). If anything those lists should be emulating this one, not the other way around.
In any case I do believe that the Falcon 1-9 are different, and are treated differently by the secondary sources (as evidenced by the Gunter's space page links above]]. The Falcons are not the only example of this on Gunter's directory of US launch vehicles,[3] you'll see that the 'Atlas Family'[4] is treated as a separate entity to the 'Atlas 5'[5]. And if you navigate to the Atlas Family page you will note that it doesn't include the Atlas 5. Similarly, There are multiple families listed for Long March vehicles,[6] separated by architecture, rather than by 'manufacturer name'. These are indeed listed as separate families.[7]
There seems to be more than one way to skin a cat here. While most of the Wikipedia articles do mostly treat 'rocket family' categorisation as a naming convention, it's not actually clear that the secondary sources treat them that way. In short: we can do what we want with regards to organising the articles. Editors preferred to have a list of SpaceX launch vehicles rather than "Falcon (rocket family)". Feel free to request an RM regarding that, it might even be successful, but even if it was it would not obligate us to add the Falcon 1 launches here. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 22:25, 6 February 2020 (UTC)
Of course using the correct classification for the Falcon family doesn't obligate this list to include Falcon 1, these are independent issues (and indeed this is how the pages were for several years).
I don't see how this random guy's personal webpage qualifies as a source. Appropriate sources for this matter would be the rocket companies themselves, and specialized media (e.g. spaceflightnow.com). In any case, I hope you agree that Wikipedia should use a consistent definition of "rocket family". How the manufacturer decides to name their rockets is a simple, objective criterion, that is used in every other page.
I'm definitely not doing a RM. I'm tired of arguing with the incredibly stubborn and uncivil people that edit this page. I give up on trying to help. Do whatever you want with it, have fun. You won. I'll spend my time on less hostile corners of Wikipedia. Tercer (talk) 09:24, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

I think I speak for many editors when I say, "Thank you." You really do have a "I'm right no matter what everyone else thinks" attitude, and it really is a huge time sink for other people. If no one, or just a small number of people, share your opinion, the rest of us would really appreciate it if you simply dropped the matter. Fcrary (talk) 22:45, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

How do I drop the matter, Fcrary? I'm not the one that requested the move, I cannot drop it. Here I just pointed out the obvious, that banning discussion doesn't solve the problem, and I'm replying back to the people that reply to me. Should I ignore their replies instead? Tercer (talk) 08:33, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
Tercer, Not everyone sees it as a "problem" in need of being solved, and, important for you to understand, not everyone has your... fervor... for argument. Such discussions can be exhausting. And honestly, discussions with you that I've had on this page since you've arrived are just that; exhausting. Moreover, you seem unwilling to "see the other side" of the argument and accept the fact that some people just have a different view and that no amount of arguing is going to change their mind. I don't say this to try to get a 'dig' in on you; I have in the past acted similarly (including a topic ban in the distant past, and I was the main instigator in two of the RMs at Talk:Genesis creation narrative). I was very reluctant to take you to ANI even when it would have been very easy to justify such a thing during the previous repeated discussion about the graphs. While, yes, the article was improved marginally, and that might make you feel vindicated; consider that the effort and editor time required was enormous. The effort to improvement ratio was wildly off kilter in the above discussions, and that's why people were getting so fed up by the end of it. Other discussions, such as repeated attempts to change the title/scope in face of overwhelming opposition, similarly meet resistance from those that know that they have now been forced to waste their time writing another' comment opposing the proposal again. When you badger people, like you did to me in the above discussion, it just exacerbates the problem. Again I've been there; go look at the the RM I started at GCN, I'm the badger there. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 21:45, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
This wall of text is simply a personal attack on me. I'm not responding. Tercer (talk) 22:34, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
Tercer, It's not a personal attack mate... it's heartfelt advice from someone who has been there before. I'm a bit disappointed that you don't want to hear it. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 22:41, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
Perhaps you didn't mean it as an insult, but "advice" repeatedly implying that I'm an obstinate fool and a petulant child is nothing but an insult. You should consider the fact that from my point of view you are forcing me to waste a huge amount of time with minor matters, and repeatedly insulting me in the process. And now you have the audacity to give me advice about my behaviour? Did you ever consider the possibility that you, not me, are the one in need of advice? Please do take into account the fact that I've been editing Wikipedia for more than a decade, and never had a problem with other people. Except here. Tercer (talk) 23:34, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Let's keep this discussion on-topic, instead of whatever on Earth has been going on in the past few comments. Ultimately, we shouldn't really need a disclaimer at the top of the page; {{Old moves}} should be enough to give prospective proposers the knowledge they need before making a new requested move. We shouldn't be discouraging discussion simply because a few editors find it "annoying". Furthermore I want to note that it says a lot about the temperament of some of our fellow editors here when they complain of move discussions, yet there had been only two formal move discussions – complaint with the procedures laid out at Wikipedia:Requested moves – before the current discussion. The first one was accepted. The second one was rejected, but directly led to an accepted scope change in a related article. Discussions need to occur whether our fellow editors like it or not, and going ahead with actions that'll discourage discussion would be a gross overreaction to editors with opposing viewpoints, in my opinion. – PhilipTerryGraham (talk · articles · reviews) 01:04, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

It's not the fault of people who get tired of the discussions that a very vocal minority can't be bothered to create formal move proposals. Anyway, now we had one, it was clearly rejected. --mfb (talk) 08:18, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Dude, you should spend your energy on resuming constructive discussions of things you personally undid to the main page. 205.175.106.197 (talk) 19:51, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

Booster landings chart y axis?

Is there some way to fix the y axis of the "Booster landings" chart? Looking back and forth between it and "Launch outcomes", I think it would be clearer if they both had the same range (as opposed to the current 0 to 30 for the former and 0 to 40 for the later. I don't know enough about charts to know if that's possible, let along do it myself. Fcrary (talk) 01:19, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

It's possible to add a dummy category that is white and has no label. It can increase the chart range. It's awkward but it works somewhat. --mfb (talk) 02:40, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Additional historical visualisation of launches

I have made a Github like activity chart of historical SpaceX launches. What do you think of a visualisation like this link? Jacobkjaersgaardhansen (talk) 15:13, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

for me too big. can you compress by week? there are only 2 launches in 1 week to today, you can use a different colour. --Dwalin (talk) 18:19, 12 March 2020 (UTC)
I see your point, good idea! Jacobkjaersgaardhansen (talk) 12:48, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

SpaceX CRS-21 and 22:

SpaceX CRS-21 has gone to the right and is now scheduled to launch at the end of Oct 2020 unless delayed further. That means it will return to land sometime towards the end of 2020. Yet, future launches shows SpaceX CRS-22 being launched at the end of 2020 since SpaceX CRS-21 is still incorrectly shown as launching in early August 2020. I am not trying to make the necessary corrections as I have been unable to log on to my account in spite of several attempts. Abul Bakhtiar 103.60.175.28 (talk) 19:56, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Number of launches versus launch numbering

How is it that, as of this writing, the article says the F9 has been launched "87 times over 10 years, resulting in 85 full mission successes (97.7%)", yet in the actual table of launches, the most recent launch (April 22) is only numbered as #84? Are there launches not in this table, and should we have a separate table for those? — Wisq (talk) 01:12, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

The first number counts the Falcon Heavy flights, but they are not numbered as such below in the list, instead having their own number series marked with “FH”. Metropod (talk) 11:39, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

@Wisq: Note that it says "rockets from the Falcon 9 family" (which includes Falcon Heavy), not "Falcon 9" (which would not). --mfb (talk) 02:33, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

Most expensive payload?

RADARSAT launched in June 2019. As of now this page says that the RADARSAT (RCM) mission was the second most expensive payload flown (this has been changed/"debated" a few times [8], [9], and [10] in articles). The citation given right now (https://spaceflightnow.com/2017/06/02/ariane-5-succeeds-in-launch-of-two-high-value-communications-satellites/) does not say this.

In the citation we had before (before the revert) says:

  • "Additionally, RCM will likely become the most valuable payload ever launched by SpaceX, beating out the Air Force’s ~$600M GPS III SV01 spacecraft by a huge margin. For RCM, mission assurance is definitively second to none." (from Teslarati). Saying that RADARSAT is the most expensive payload.

However other references indicate otherwise:

  • "RCM payload is one of the most expensive ever booked on a SpaceX Falcon 9." (from CBS)
  • "The trio of satellites cost Canada about $900 million to build, likely making this the second most valuable payload SpaceX has launched. The top secret Zuma satellite that SpaceX launched in January 2018 was reportedly worth about $3.5 billion." (from CNBC)

So from these, RADARSAT IS the most expensive payload out of all the missions we know officially the cost of. We don't know the official cost of Zuma. However, if we assume Zuma's speculated price (which is probably OK in this case - CNBC/Michael Sheetz seems reliable) is correct, RADARSAT is not the most expensive payload. (which conflicts which I heard before ) @AndrewRG10:. OkayKenji (talk page) 05:08, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for summing it up perfectly. Yes, it is the most expensive 'commercial' satellite which is why I left it, but Zuma is much more expensive. I don't know who started the rumour RADARSat was the most expensive but it's gotten to the point it's ridiculous that people state it as fact and that even though I fixed that claim months ago someone came along and changed it. Cheers for looking a bit deeper into it mate. -AndrewRG10 (talk) 07:24, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Removing Zuma from notable missions

The notable mission section in itself is pretty cluttered. A lot of them have great justification for being there like first crewed flight, the mission failures and the first re-flights. However, I would like to remove Zuma. The justification for it being there is that there were some fake news articles that it was lost and despite both SpaceX and the US government saying it was fine. I think the info on it should be left in its launch info section and not be called notable. I however don't want to remove it if there is opposition to the idea. -AndrewRG10 (talk) 02:24, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

Where does the US government say the satellite is fine? The launch was, yes. The discussion what happened to the satellite got significant media attention: It was a notable launch. It was also said to be the most expensive payload of SpaceX at that time. --mfb (talk) 02:36, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
I have also had the thought that the section is getting cluttered. I do find Zuma interesting, but if there were one to remove it’d probably be that. I guess I don’t have strong feeling either way, but did want to concur about the clutter. Grey Wanderer (talk) 05:34, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Use of "pietrobon" source for future launches

I'm a bit concerned with the overuse of the "pietrobon" source (http://www.sworld.com.au/steven/space/uscom-man.txt) for future launches. It's a self-published personal page from the founder of an Australian firmware company, so I can't see how it is a reliable source for future SpaceX launches. Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Incubator/Black projects#External says Handle with care. The author has been published by a number of major scientific organisations (admittedly not all in this field), and his historical information seems fairly accurate. Care should be taken when using his pages on future launches, as they are often out of date, and may even contain launches which were cancelled some time ago. Looking at the data, he doesn't say where he's getting dates from, but in many cases it seems to be from publicly available sources such as FCC filings and the like, which are very poor indicators of reality (for example, the June 13th Starlink launch had a FCC license valid starting 5/1, but the launch was six weeks later). While it's a nice summary, in almost every case that it is used there is a better more reliable source for the data, or the data isn't accurate enough to list here. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 21:30, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

We'll definetly have to look into some unreliable sources. There are a few problems with the listings of future launches, that being we don't hear weekily updates on how they're tracking for launch. However, I do minorly doubt there are cancelled launches still listed. Launch campaings being cancelled or moved to another launcher are things that don't go unoticed and thus get removed quite quickly. Will look into some of those sources and see how reliable they are. --AndrewRG10 (talk) 22:02, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
I wouldn't want to lose both Launch Photography (LP) (Ben Cooper) and Pietrobon as that would really leave us with just sfn_ls which IMO is not enough. My comments on sources would be:
  • LP: Short term only, rapidly updated, reliable info.
  • sfn_ls: good and pretty reliable info, recently can go a week without being updated
  • Pietrobon: some things do occasionally get out of date but we will often be aware of these issues from other sources. I think this shows need to use a few sources not cut it down to just one source.
  • Starlink rideshare: seems probably only showing available flights so there could be others that are filled

There was another source used which I felt contained out of date info for much longer than Pietrobon but this seems to not be in use at present.

Using sources other than Pietrobon where available may well be sensible. However, if it is only source at time of making edit and then later other sources show the same then this shows fast reliability of the info there and should we really have to bother to change the source? So of the sources, I am least keen on Pietrobon, but I don't want to see available sources cut down too much. Definitely want to keep LP despite RS issue - sometimes RS is only thing that matters but sometimes other issues also play a role and here, with future dates that are inherrently unreliable and subject to frequent changes which may not reach all sources rapidly, crosschecking info with other sources is important. crandles (talk) 13:09, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

SXRS-1

Spaceflight Inc. has dubbed Starlink V1.0 L9 as SXRS-1, with 2 BlackSky Global satellites ridesharing on the mission. Would it be wise to change the mission's information under the payload column to say "SXRS-1 (BlackSky Global 5 and 6)" under "Starlink 9 v1.0 (57 Satellites)" as this would be Spaceflight Inc's first of SpaceX and Spaceflight Inc's rideshare launches? So assuming that they continue on with the naming convention, succeeding rideshare mission would then be labeled as SXRS-2 and so on. And on a different note, wouldn't Spaceflight Inc. be the customer seen as BlackSky is a customer to Spaceflight? --AFLBulawan (talk) 21:11, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

In SXRS-1 there is nothing to identify this as relating to Spaceflight Inc. Is this confusing? Will people wonder why Starlink L8 (w SkySats) isn't SXRS-1? Are references used by customers important enough to include? If SpaceX also starts using it, then fair enough we should include it, but if SpaceX doesn't use it then I am reluctant. crandles (talk) 21:27, 25 June 2020 (UTC)
Most of the typical spaceflight refs (SpaceNews,SpaceflightNow,NASASpaceflight) don't seem to use that, only https://spaceflight.com/spaceflight-to-launch-its-first-rideshare-payloads-on-a-spacex-starlink-mission/ uses it - so if those refs start using that we could do it. But I agree with crandles here. (we could do whats done in 2020 in spaceflight and write "SmallSat Rideshare Mission to deploy BlackSky Global 7 and 8; first Starlink rideshare contracted with Spaceflight Industries, dubbed "SXRS-1"" in the description maybe) OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 22:24, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Date formats

Should dmy (1 January 2000) or mdy (January 1, 2000) be used? Previously launches used mdy format. Now the first 50 use dmy. Rest use mdy. Don't really mind which format we use but consistency is important (MOS:DATERET). There might be an overall discussion to use consistent date formats on all pages on Category:Lists of rocket launches (topic consistency) but perhaps that something for another day. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 02:42, 8 August 2020 (UTC)

Courtesy notification to @CRS-20: per this edit [11] OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 02:48, 8 August 2020 (UTC)
@OkayKenji: Hello, I put dmy on the List of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches as Crew Dragon Demo-2. Cordially. CRS-20 (talk) 01:10, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
Ok, Thanks for the response. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 02:21, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
As much as I'd like to see everything convert to DMY, if the article originally used MDY then that's what it should use barring a consensus to change formats. I can easily switch everything back with a script, unless there is an objection. — Huntster (t @ c) 04:13, 9 August 2020 (UTC)

If we start a new line for the time for every entry, I don't think there should be a ',' separator at the end of the date line. I don't think anything is required but if people want to insist on a separator I would suggest it should be a '.' rather than a ','. I don't think the header should have the 'and' either but maybe others think differently? crandles (talk) 19:02, 11 August 2020 (UTC)

personally now that all of the dates or DMY, I don't mind keeping it as is even though it was changed without consensus. I would keep "," over a "." though - no particular Wikipeida policy to site but comma looks better, but that's what I think, what do other editors think? OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 23:24, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
Perhaps, to try to explain further, it possibly depends on whether you think of it as a list or like an address (i.e. launch site column) where , separator makes sense or a new paragraph where . makes sense. I suggest it isn't a list of dates or times, it is a mixture of different things: dates on one line and time on a separate line. For a list of similar things on one line, I would prefer a , but this is different things on different lines. My gut reaction was that , was unnecessary but I guess it is arguable in many different ways and if we don't get consensus it should stay as is. crandles (talk) 00:25, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
Makes sense, and now that I think about it MDY format didn't have a comma at the end either. So I'm ok with removing the separators. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 02:21, 14 August 2020 (UTC)

At 10:31 AM EDT, August 18, 2020, Starlink 11 was launched from CCAFS in Florida. I am requesting an edit for the article, so Starlink 11 can be moved from 'Planned Launches' and into 'Past Launches'.

Thanks, --Locked Soul (talk) 15:09, 18 August 2020 (UTC)

It has been added by Mfb. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 21:39, 18 August 2020 (UTC)

More SES launches in 2021

I'm unsure how this relates to the existing SES entry for the same satellite type, however. Article by floridatoday. --mfb (talk) 02:29, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

Symbol for new boosters?

Most flights are on reused boosters now, new boosters are more noteworthy than reuse for future launches at least. Should we add a symbol for flights known to use a new booster? --mfb (talk) 19:52, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

i don't like the idea of a symbol for the new booster. --Dwalin (talk) 11:17, 24 August 2020 (UTC)
Agreed. I think the decimal convention for the serial number is enough of an indication. — Huntster (t @ c) 13:36, 24 August 2020 (UTC)
Okay, then we can keep it in the comments whenever we know it will be a new booster (but don't have an assignment yet). --mfb (talk) 20:14, 24 August 2020 (UTC)

Falcon launch lists vs. other Wikipedia "List of ... launches'" articles

Some of the Wikipedia List-of-launch-vehicle-launches articles are grouped by the name of the rocket, and divided up across many separate articles by decade, even though the rockets used over those decades are vastly different. (e.g., grouping all Thor Delta vehicles made by the same government contractor division (even when owned by McDonnell Douglas, Boeing, United Launch Alliance, etc. due to merger/acquistions) as if all those launch vehicles are comparable from 1957 to 2020. Here's the current division into eight lists: List of Thor and Delta launches

I find that a bit odd, and don't think it serves our readers very well. I have suggested we think about an alternative way of grouping these lists, more by similarity of the rocket designs, like is done with the quite similar rockets of the List of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches article. Where we don't include the very different Falcon 1 with the much-larger and similar 9-engine-core rockets F9 and FH.

I've started a discussion about the eight (8) articles that make up the eight decades of Thor/Delta launches. More input from editors who think broadly about Wikipedia spaceflight would be most welcome. Please join the discussion, here. Cheers. N2e (talk) 17:51, 29 August 2020 (UTC)

Add fairing recovery results to each launch listing

We could have the following results: - Both caught - Both recovered from sea - Both lost

Or a combination of: - One caught... - One recovered from sea... - One lost

user:mnw2000 14:54, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

For now, I would think a comment if a fairing catch attempt is made or not, and the status would be enough (caught; fished out and reusable; fished out but not reusable; recovery failed). Once it becomes commonplace for SpaceX to try to recover the fairings, then it might be possible.
AmigaClone (talk) 01:23, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

Is the "launch number" list in this article correct?

The article shows the SAOCOM launch today as #92 on the List_of_Falcon_9_and_Falcon_Heavy_launches. There were five Falcon 1 launches. So, total of 97 there.

Yet, various news sources today were reporting SAOCOM as SpaceX 100th launch, or 101st if you count the never-launched-but-died-on-the-launch-pad Amos-6 anomaly.

So, which is correct? 97 total through today? or 100? This is a WP:GOOD list, so we should all care to get this straightened out. Cheers. N2e (talk) 02:01, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

92 is the 92nd Falcon 9 launch. Then we have 3 Falcon Heavy launches (FH1, FH2 and FH3 - they are numbered separately from the Falcon 9s). So 95 launches are listed here. Plus the Amos-6 mission is listed here but not counted (so we have 95 launches listed here but 96 missions). We do not include the 5 Falcon 1 launches (see Talk:List of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches/Archive 9 on why) but if they were here it will bring it up to 100 launches or 101 missions. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 04:28, 31 August 2020 (UTC)
That was a super clear and complete explanation of the phenomenon OkayKenji. Appreciate it. Good to know that this Wikipedia Good list is fully compliant with reality; unlike a number of WP list articles that can get rather out of date. N2e (talk) 11:46, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

eventual split

All other rocket launches are split by decade. Eventually this article will have to be split into launches up to 2019 and launches since 2020. 205.175.106.163 (talk) 23:02, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

Why would it be necessary to do that? Splitting this would only make it harder to get one complete list in which the reader can search something. Gial Ackbar (talk) 17:14, 6 September 2020 (UTC)
I agree with the idea of splitting this article into 3 or possibly 4 smaller articles. The first article would be a 'cover' page that would have the general information - basically all that is above the line 'Past Launches' and links to the 'decades'. The next two articles would mostly consist of the 'List of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches 2010-2019' and 'List of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches 2020-2029'
If the option for 4 articles is done then that article would include only the 5 Falcon 1 launches (2006-2009)

AmigaClone (talk) 11:55, 7 September 2020 (UTC)

Eventually size will mean there does need to be some split, but for next ~12 months or maybe until at least 50 launches in 2020-, I would suggest not yet. Also suggest better to make decisions then rather than now. crandles (talk) 14:31, 7 September 2020 (UTC)
Not only for readability but I've noticed that this article takes longer to edit in VisualEditor as it takes a bit more time to load all the tables compared to other articles. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 21:55, 7 September 2020 (UTC)
The problem is not with how many launches have been until now, but with the extensive list of planned launches that is rapidly increasing. It is at 70+ currently, at a list of just under 100 completed launches. I think the article would be far easier to maintain if the first chapter up to including 2019 would be closed, as per ALL the other rocket launch lists. 2601:602:9200:1310:54CC:F2B6:EB61:70E7 (talk) 20:00, 5 October 2020 (UTC)

Nov 3 launch time

The source cited says 22:58 GMT. I don't know what is correct. There may be a DST/EST confusion. Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 06:17, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

@Bubba73:, 22:58 GMT looks like the NROL-101 mission by ULA. The source cited says "2328-2343 GMT" (on Nov 4) as the window for the GPS IIISV03 mission. In addition the local time listed there and here corresponds to 23:28 UTC time. I might be wrong though... OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 14:45, 1 November 2020 (UTC)
Oh I was partly wrong, it should have read 5 November (at 23:24). Looks like the source was updated just now. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 15:10, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

Identifying landing locations

Instead of "ground pad" and "drone ship", it seems like we should name the ground pad or drone ship used. I proofed the concept in my sandbox, but I didn't want to make live changes without consensus. Jwolfe (talk) 08:30, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

Link to that sandbox. I don't think it's that relevant. There is a related discussion on the booster list talk page: Talk:List of Falcon 9 first-stage boosters#Adding Launch and Landing Site to Outcome Columns. --mfb (talk) 11:26, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

Payload mass inconsistency

The CRS launches show the mass of the payload delivered to the ISS (eg CRS-19 shows 2,617 kg) while the Crew (both CCP and CCDev) show the mass of the Dragon plus its payload (eg Demo-2 shows 12,530 kg). We should be consistent between the two types of launch, regardless of which is chosen. I feel like this is an article about the performance of the Falcon 9, so both should include the mass of the Dragon, but I would respect a decision that went the other way. MatthewWilcox (talk) 22:35, 5 December 2020 (UTC)

Success streak?

The last time Falcon 9 has not delivered the payload to the target orbit was Amos-6, which wasn't delivered anywhere. Since then it had 74 successful missions, approaching the current 76 success streak of Atlas V - it should take the record for active rockets in February or so. We could also list 77 successful missions of Falcon rockets, but that's far away from a record (~130 for ULA). We could put either one directly behind the sentence about Amos in "Launch statistics" or mention it directly in the first paragraph in the lead. --mfb (talk) 06:17, 14 December 2020 (UTC)

Mfb, I mean... it might seem a bit of fanservice. I'm biased in favour so I'm trying to play devils advocate. I think that the statistic should be particularly noteworthy if it is going to warrant prominent inclusion. I think this would be: 1) Longest current streak, or 2) Longest ever streak. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)(click me!) 18:54, 19 December 2020 (UTC)
We do it for everything else with long success streaks. We have that number for Atlas V (List of Atlas launches) and we had it for Ariane 5 before its recent mishap - it's still listed as historic achievement in List of Ariane launches. List of Thor and Delta launches has a similar statement. Delta II even mentions its success streak in the lead. It's quite likely some source will comment on the success streak once it overtakes Atlas V, that looks like a good time to add it. --mfb (talk) 21:30, 19 December 2020 (UTC)

107 missions, 106 launches (AMOS-6 failed before launch), 105 orbital and one suborbital (in flight abort test 19 Jan 2020).

From the 106 launches, 104 were full mission successes (101 - F9, 3 - FH), one partial failure (SpaceX CRS-1), one total loss of spacecraft (SpaceX CRS-7) and AMOS-6 explosion before launch

  • 78 consecutive successful missions for the Falcon family: 18 + 21 + 13 + 26 - Falcon 9 has 75 and Falcon Heavy has 3
  • 87 consecutive successful launches (AMOS-6) was a mission but failed before attempting launch - 3 of them FH
  • From those 75 Falcon 9 launches, 47 are Falcon 9 Block 5
  • 70 succesful Falcon booster landings
  • 20 consecutive succesful Falcon booster landings

Barecode (talk) 19:15, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

Launch Outcomes chart

Hi, given that in the table the launches to come are divided by Commercial and Starlink with two different colors, why not also divide the ones that have been successful instead of making them all a single color? Maybe commercial flights with light green and Starlink with dark green would certainly be more useful 

--Superdave x (talk) 07:43, 9 September 2020 (UTC)
The planned launches are separated as SpaceX likes to make overly optimistic estimates for its Starlink launches (where they launch whenever they can), while other launches have well-defined payloads that wait for a launch - their number will change less. For launches that happened this isn't an issue any more. We could make a new graph of launch by type. Dragon, commercial, scientific/military, Starlink, other. --mfb (talk) 08:07, 9 September 2020 (UTC)

Data

Year US Government SpaceX Commercial
NASA DoD/Military Other Starlink Dedicated rideshare Other Non-military Military
Dragon 1 Dragon 2 Other USAF/USSF NRO
Uncrewed/Cargo Crewed
2010 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0
2011 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2012 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2013 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0
2014 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 4 0
2015 3 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 3 0
2016 2 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 6 0
2017 4 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 0 12 0
2018 3 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 14 0
2019 3 1 0 0 1 0 0 2 0 0 6 0
2020 1 1 1 0 1 0 0 13 0 0 1 1
Above is a table of customers. The main customer is defined by whoever is listed first in the "Customer" column. Some notes:
  • USAF and USSF is combined as it seems like some of the Air Forces not are under the authority of the Space Force (GPS SVIII-01 vs. GPS SVIII-04)
  • Non-US military but military payload (and space agency) fall under commercial.
  • Zuma despite saying the customer is NG, the customer is technically US Gov't.
  • "Dedicated rideshare" refers to SpaceX's program (not the SSO-A flight that had a few year back)
  • Amos-6 and CRS-7 is included.
  • DSCOVR is USAF
  • Forgot to count which ones are scientific...but guessing all NASA other then Dragon are scientific.
  • If you mouse over the numbers a list of missions should come up. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 03:26, 27 October 2020 (UTC)
created via Google Sheets because charts are complicated. Once consensus is made will convert to Wikipedia chart
Which version is best? Open to other designs as well. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 06:01, 27 October 2020 (UTC)

Discussion

So many categories. I would merge dedicated rideshares and "other SpaceX" or put the rideshares under "commercial". I wouldn't split commercial. I would merge all US military launches. That also puts Zuma into that category, so other US government launches can be removed as empty column. I would merge Dragon 1/2 and just have Dragon->crewed/uncrewed. 12 -> 7 categories. Basically the bottom graph, color scheme to be discussed. --mfb (talk) 14:20, 27 October 2020 (UTC)
DEMO 1 is a crewed dragon uncrewed or we consider it a uncrewed dragon?--Dwalin (talk) 14:36, 27 October 2020 (UTC)
Uncrewed dragon. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 20:00, 27 October 2020 (UTC)
5
10
15
20
25
30
2010
'11
'12
'13
'14
'15
'16
'17
'18
'19
'20
  •   Dragon
  •   NASA LSP
  •   Starlink
  •   SpaceX other
  •   Commercial
  •   U.S. Military
Per Mfb combined Dragons. Combined all US Military Zuma. Rideshare is under SpaceX other. Colors are meh. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 23:26, 27 October 2020 (UTC)
Starlink/Internal SpaceX should be combined under the same color. Rideshare Starlink is more different from regular Starlink than the latter is from FH test flight, cause SpX made money on the former. And NASA LSP should be merged under NASA uncrewed, and a separate manned flight category should exist. 2601:602:9200:1310:7905:B9CF:BDFE:B296 (talk) 03:01, 1 November 2020 (UTC)
5
10
15
20
25
30
2010
'11
'12
'13
'14
'15
'16
'17
'18
'19
'20
  •   NASA uncrewed missions
  •   Crewed missions
  •   Starlink/test flights
  •   SpaceX Smallsat Rideshare Program
  •   Commercial
  •   U.S. Military
Like this? Let me know if I misunderstood something. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 19:28, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

I think a better segregation could be targeted orbit: LEO, Starlink, Crewed, MEO, GTO/GEO, TLI, heliocentric. 205.175.106.39 (talk) 02:38, 25 November 2020 (UTC)

I like the graph above (missed it earlier). --mfb (talk) 08:10, 25 November 2020 (UTC)

What about commercial crewed flights? Like for Axios and that other group? Dg21dg21 (talk) 14:46, 20 January 2021 (UTC)

Ref tags immediately after text/punctuation

Someone keeps adding spaces before ref tags. The Manual of Style is quite clear saying

Ref tags (<ref>...</ref>) are used to create footnotes (sometimes called endnotes or notes), as explanatory notes or citation footnotes. All ref tags should immediately follow the text to which the footnote applies, with no intervening space (except possibly a hair space, generated by  ), and are placed after adjacent punctuation, not before (apart from the exceptions below). Adjacent ref tags should have no space between them.

Please desist. crandles (talk) 01:16, 22 January 2021 (UTC)

no. of payloads on sherpa fx

i found out 20 payloads but its only space for 17 payloads only, please help me in this Chinakpradhan (talk) 04:14, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

13 deployable, 2 hosted. --Jrcraft Yt (talk) 06:32, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
https://spaceflight.com/sp-missions/sxrs-3/ may be helpful OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 22:13, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

Transport-1 will be the first to use 3rd stage? (also SHERPA undue weight discussion)

I've just noticed that SSO-A has already used SHERPA. Is that doesn't count as 3rd stage, as Transport-1 is listed as "first Falcon 9 flight with 3rd stage"? Thanks FarhanSyafiqF (talk) 15:13, 11 January 2021 (UTC)

Because the SHERPA used on SSO-A was a first gen passive unit where as the SHERPA-NG (next generation) being used on Transporter-1 is a series of unpropelled, bi-propellent and Xenon propelled upper/kick stages akin to the Electron's kick stage. It's written in the same way as other upper stages are on Wikipedia list articles (rocket) / (upper stage) like Fregat and Briz-M are. --Jrcraft Yt (talk) 08:39, 12 January 2021 (UTC)

SHERPA was used for a small fraction of the overall payloads. It's very different from a conventional third stage. What do we do if another rideshare mission has two of these space tugs (this was planned for Transporter-1, but the other one didn't get approved in time)? Do we write Falcon 9 launched with two third stages? That's just silly. --mfb (talk) 00:11, 26 January 2021 (UTC)

I'm inclined to say that the SHERPA isn't a third stage. That would imply it's part of the launch vehicle. The SHERPA plus the spacecraft it transports are, I think, more properly considered part of the Falcon 9 payload, not part of the Falcon 9 launch vehicle. One of the distinctions is that, once the SHERPA and whatever it's carrying are deployed, SpaceX' responsibility is over and it's up to whoever is operating the SHERPA to get the satellite to its destination. (Although I admit that distinction is a bit fuzzy when it comes to Rocket Lab's Electron and Photon...) Fcrary (talk) 03:29, 26 January 2021 (UTC)
Agree with mfb and Fcrary SHERPA isn't part of the SpaceX Falcon 9 launch vehicle systems and shouldn't be treated as a third stage. Also at least potentially undue weight issue with showing SHERPA as a third stage when used for small proportion of the payloads. Suggest removal from Version column, (the "First flight of a Falcon 9 with a SHERPA-FX transfer stage" sentence is sufficient). crandles (talk) 11:33, 26 January 2021 (UTC)

Transporter-1

The SpaceX commentator on the webcast said 133 sats plus the 10 Starlink sats (which is what the article now says; so all good there) but also said there were two OTVs (orbital transfer vehicles). We've got mention of only one of the two OTVs listed in the article?

What was the other one?

Also, do we have any good sources that would help the article summarize a comparison between the two of them? (no. of sats? / mass of sats transported? / how large an orbital difference (from the F9 deployment orbit) will each OTV impart to their attached sats? / are both of them validly considered to be "3rd stages"? Seems to me like we want to be neutral and balanced in the coverage of both of the two OTVs, as well as the larger no. of sats that SpaceX deployed directly from the F9 2nd stage. Cheers. N2e (talk) 21:30, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

The next launch of a SHERPA-NG is a SHERPA-LTE which delivers up to 6km/s of Δv. The difference between The SHERPA-NG (next generation) line and the ION-SCV is that SHERPA-LCT/LTE are designed for greatly changing the orbits of the payloads they carry, while ION-SCV essentially manages deployment rather than provides a large Δv change. --Jrcraft Yt (talk) 06:39, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

But what was the second of two OTVs that the SpaceX commentator mentioned. SHERPA is one. What was the other? N2e (talk) 23:12, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

@N2e: Not sure 100%, but looking at https://www.spacex.com/launches/, It says "EXOport-2, with 28 spacecraft aboard, begins deployment" and same with EXOport1. But for Sherpa it says "Spaceflight Inc's Sherpa-FX1 spacecraft deploys with 13 spacecraft on board". From that I assume that for EXOPort remains attached to S2 but Sherpa-FX1 itself deploys then it does its mission. The next event it says, "D-Orbit’s Pulse mission deploys with 20 spacecraft on board". I 'haven't researched D-Orbit mission yet, but per the wording matching Sherpa, it sounds like D-orbit is a OTV that separates from S2 and does its mission. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 01:35, 28 January 2021 (UTC)
Seems so (in Italian) crandles (talk) 01:44, 28 January 2021 (UTC)
See also [12] & [13] by Jonathan McDowell which suggests that Pulse is some sort of OTV, https://www.dorbit.space/mission-updates-old also says similar things. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 01:49, 28 January 2021 (UTC)
Thanks OkayKenji and crandles. That is helpful. It's pretty clear that no one source has quite put the definitive story together for what exactly was on Transporter-1; probably because of contract language that prevents SpaceX from releasing some info, and some companies not inclined to fully disclose publicly.
Do you think we have enough sources to support saying the two OTVs were Pulse and SHERPA? N2e (talk) 05:03, 28 January 2021 (UTC)
Yes. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 17:14, 1 February 2021 (UTC)
We could link to the 2021 in spaceflight page in case a reader wants to see all the sats launched. Like this here. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 17:14, 1 February 2021 (UTC)

Someone should create a "SpaceX Dedicated Smallsat launches" that should cover Transporter-1 and the upcoming dedicated rideshares. 205.175.106.98 (talk) 06:19, 4 February 2021 (UTC)

Should be counted as them happening or is each launch marked in some way on the hardware ? About my changes. --Robertiki (talk) 18:00, 4 February 2021 (UTC)

The Starlink numbering from what I understand comes from official paperwork. The launch from SLC-40 on Feb 4th (flew on B1060.5) was officially designated as "Starlink L18 v1.0". Also for example, see the 45th weather squadron, they are saying the upcoming launch (in a few hoursdays) is "Starlink v1.0 L17". The reason why 'L17' and 'L18' flew out of order was because the launch designated as 'L17' was delayed such that it fell after the one called 'L18'. tldr; the numbers here reflect what the sources[14]/official papers use and not the order they were launched in. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 18:30, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
We don't choose the name of the launch, this is based on launch licensing and internal SpaceX numbering scheme. Renaming a Starlink mission just for Wikipedia means we would have to rename almost every Shuttle mission because they all launched out of order. That will not be happening even though by the looks of it L19 will launch before L17. -AndrewRG10 (talk) 20:17, 5 February 2021 (UTC)
I understand that we are not giving a launch numbering, as I thought, but citing a SpaceX batch numbering. I guess every Starlink satellite has a number, and SpaceX has a transport list with each satellite listed in a definite batch. So changing batch number to launch sequence would be a inventory nightmare. It should be explained that we are talking of batches and not launches. And hopefully the media knows the difference. --Robertiki (talk) 22:24, 5 February 2021 (UTC)
But that gives more confusion because Starlink 19 is the 20th large batch because there was one large batch of v0.9 satellites before v1.0 batches and SpaceX's numbering started with the V1.0 launches. As Mfb says we report the launch name used by SpaceX whatever that is. I don't think we have an official name or number for the batches that we can report. crandles (talk) 21:36, 7 February 2021 (UTC)
We give the name of the launch. Typically these names are in ascending order for Starlink launches, this time two launches were swapped. We explain the reason in the table. --mfb (talk) 00:02, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
What is "the name of the launch" ? --Robertiki (talk) 16:44, 7 February 2021 (UTC)
Starlink 17. If SpaceX launches Starlink 18 before Starlink 17, that's fine. If they call their next mission Starlink 101 then we'll report that in the table, together with a comment how it's confusing. --mfb (talk) 18:20, 7 February 2021 (UTC)
We should take care to not mix the launch numbering with the batch numbering, as in "Fourteenth operational launch of Starlink satellites ..." referring to batch Starlink 14 of v1.00, for example. If we include the v0.90 launch, it would be the fifteenth launch. And with the launch of Starlink 17 we should take care to not write Seventeenth operational launch, and I don't agree if sources would state that, that a encyclopedia should blindly following them, if illogical (if it could be an argument). --Robertiki (talk) 10:19, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

Time 8:28 was the start of the launch window. SpaceX launch live video ( https://youtu.be/a15czI9B91c ) says at minute 6 that it was four and twenty eight. And that 11 minutes before lift-off. News sources and blogs may get it wrong. If we have actual facts, we should use them. --Robertiki (talk) 04:00, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

Embarrassing, I lost "awaiting" before 8:28 so launch time is actually 8:28. --Robertiki (talk) 04:08, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

Collapsible year sections?

I'm not super familiar with Wiki markup language. Is there a way to make the year sections collapsible (preferably collapsed by default, but with a button to expand all sections)? This would allow scrolling through the page easier. The page is getting to be so long. Ergzay (talk) 18:21, 7 April 2021 (UTC)

This is no good idea as you would have to open all the lists if you search for something specific. Gial Ackbar (talk) 19:26, 7 April 2021 (UTC)

Booster (and Dragon) numbering

I've been wondering about the reflight booster and dragon numbering, because it's inconsistent. Some of the sources (like NASA Spaceflight, Everyday Astronaut) say that the booster numbering is using dash instead of dot (according to "internal numbering") (so it's B1058-7 instead of B1058.7), while this article still using dot. However, the Dragon numbering on this article is using dash (for example C206-2) instead of dot. Can anyone give any explanation? Thanks. FarhanSyafiqF (talk) 03:36, 8 April 2021 (UTC)

Statistics

Number of launches by year
Year Launches Success Failure Partial
Failure
2010 2 2 0 0
2012 2 1 0 1
2013 3 3 0 0
2014 6 6 0 0
2015 7 6 1 0
2016 9 8 1 0
2017 18 18 0 0
2018 21 21 0 0
2019 13 13 0 0
2020 26 26 0 0
  • 4 Launches in a month: Nov 2020
  • 2 days between two launches: 23 and 25 June 2017 - 9 and 11 Oct 2017 - 3 and 5 December 2018
  • 3 days between two launches: 22 and 25 July 2018

Booster reuses:

  • 2 times - B1021.2 - 30 March 2017 - SES-10
  • 3 times - B1046-3 - 3 December 2018 - SSO-A
  • 4 times - B1048-4 - 11 November 2019 - Starlink 1
  • 5 times - B1048-5 - 18 March 2020 - Starlink 5 - failed landing
    • 5 times - B1049-5 - 4 June 2020 - Starlink 7
  • 6 times - B1049.6 - 18 August 2020 - Starlink 10
  • 7 times - B1049.7 - 25 November 2020 - Starlink 15
  • 8 times - B1051.8 - 20 January 2021 - Starlink 16
  • B1051 was used 5 times in 2020
  • B1056 was used 3 times in 2019
  • B1046 was used 3 times in 2018
  • B1029 was used 2 times in 2017

Barecode (talk) 21:58, 21 January 2021 (UTC)

Ok. So what is your point? Do you think that table should be added to the article? I think that would be redundant. And, by the way, you're listing the Amos-6 event as a failed launch. That was discussed at some length, and the consensus was that it wasn't a failed launch, since the event occurred during a ground test and prior to the launch. I think we're carrying it as a loss of the payload for "other reasons." Fcrary (talk) 06:59, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
I was gathering some interesting info, maybe some of it can be used in the article. Barecode (talk) 20:10, 27 January 2021 (UTC)
If a table like this were to be added, I would suggest adding two columns - Notes and 'Booster Recovery' (either in the format attempt/success or splitting those into two columns. AmigaClone (talk) 16:53, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

A new column for mission patches

How about adding a new column for mission patches (i.e. Crew and Cargo)? Or the patch can be included in the "Payload" column.

Date and time (UTC) Version,
Booster 		Launch site Payload Mission Patch Orbit Customer
4 May 2021
19:01 		F9 B5
B1049.9 		KSC,
LC-39A 		Starlink 25 LEO SpaceX
25th operational launch of Starlink satellites, second time a booster will fly for the ninth time.
1 June 2021
04:25 		F9 B5 CCSFS,
SLC-40 		SXM-8 GTO Sirius XM
A large, high-power broadcasting satellite for SiriusXM's digital audio radio service (DARS) contracted together with SXM-7 to replace the aging XM-4 satellite and allow broadcast to radios without the need for large dish-type antennas on the ground.
3 June 2021
~17:00 		F9 B5
B1067.1 		KSC,
LC-39A 		SpaceX CRS-22
Alpha, ARKSat 1, BeaverCube, CaNOP, CatSat, EagleSat 2, PR_Cunar2, RamSat, Stratus, Space Hauc 		LEO (ISS) NASA (CRS) and ELaNa 36
In 2015, NASA awarded SpaceX a minimum of six new cargo missions under the CRS-2 contract after the initial 20 missions of phase 1, which will be flown with an uncrewed Dragon 2 capsule.

user:mnw2000 13:34, 2 May 2021 (UTC)

I don't think that this is usefull here as only very few flights have a designated patch. It would be better (and already is) in the Drango 2 flight list. Gial Ackbar (talk) 16:57, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
I, too, don't think it is useful. We already have the problem where overenthusiastic editors have added too much information to this jam-packed List article, and oftentimes many of the details don't have good sources. N2e (talk) 11:14, 5 May 2021 (UTC)

Remove NationSat entry?, and other secondary payload rideshares

There's been no updates on NationSat other than a brief reference in 2019 to it getting delayed to 2nd quarter of 2021. The 2nd quarter of 2021 is half way through and there's been no information since. I think it's safe to assume that this will be part of one of the Rideshare entries and it should simply have it's dedicated entry removed. I'm going to go ahead and remove it and feel free to revert if you disagree. Ergzay (talk) 09:12, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

I agree with removal. To widen the discussion out, should we put payloads that are known to be secondary payload rideshares as a separate lines? Does this give misleading view of number of launches planned? e.g. Hakuto-R in March 2023- perhaps if this is going to TLI orbit and there were no TLI destinations in the table then this probably wouldn't give a misleading view of number of launches and would be ok. In fact there are TLI launches in May 2023, November 2023 and one in 2022 that includes Hakuto-R! Any thoughts on whether better to collect potential secondary rideshares in talk page and not give them their own line? Or other possible solutions? C-randles (talk) 11:38, 13 May 2021 (UTC)
Hmm, perhaps for entries that we know are rideshares, we should mark them with a special color or value or something that make them known as rideshares, and then not include them in any launch prediction statistics and note that in the article near the launch number statistics. For NationSat and other rideshares we can maybe just shove it into whatever the closest rideshare entry is with some kind of comment like "These satellites are assumed to be part of this rideshare". I think just removing all rideshares loses some information. Especially as when we go to Starship, most launches will be rideshare launches necessarily. Ergzay (talk) 12:03, 13 May 2021 (UTC)
NationSat was down as a GTO orbit which makes sense for its purpose. Dedicated rideshare flight go to SSO and Starlinks to LEO. Nearest GTO launch is SXM-8. Are you suggesting NationSat should be added back there with note it might not be correct even if we are pretty close to SXM-8 launch, there is no indication of a rideshare on that nor indicating NationSat will be launching so soon? Next GTO mission after that is Q3 2021, another secondary payload, Aurora 4A. C-randles (talk) 22:56, 13 May 2021 (UTC)
We cannot add a rideshare payload to a specific rideshare flight without confirmation that it will fly with that one. Removing the information would lose something, so I think we should keep these as separate entries - with a remark that they are expected to be a secondary payload on another mission. They should not be counted as planned launch. --mfb (talk) 00:23, 14 May 2021 (UTC)

Marking crewed flights

I added ☺ to the crewed flights. These tables include so much information, except for the very rare and very valuable human payloads. 205.175.106.86 (talk) 00:30, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

I reverted it. Please see this previous discussion. There is no "please discuss before undoing". There is "discuss before doing", especially if a nearly identical proposal was rejected in the past. --mfb (talk) 02:44, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

Looks like only 52 Starlink sats will be on v1.0-26, per T.S. Kelso @TSKelso of CelesTrak (link here)

CelesTrak has pre-launch SupTLEs for the #Starlink V1.0-26 launch scheduled for 2021-05-15 22:54 UTC. Deployment of nn Starlink satellites is planned for 98 minutes after launch at 2021-05-16 00:32:55.260 UTC over northern Mexico.

T.S. Kelso @TSKelso

Just received clarification from @SpaceX that there are only 52 #Starlink satellites and 2 rideshares on this launch.

6:58 PM · May 12, 2021·Twitter Web App

May want to watch for a reliable source that is not twitter to update the article. N2e (talk) 18:58, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

Twitter by itself is not a reliable source, but a reliable source that is posting via Twitter is. CelesTrak is definitely reliable. Ng.j (talk) 08:32, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

Sloppy sourcing

This List of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches article is an ambitious project for Wikipedia. A fairly vast array of details seems to be wanted by many editors, but many editors aren't doing the work to ensure their changes are always well sourced. And no one of the regular editors of this page seems to be performing a lookover quality check on each row once launched, to ensure that all the arcane details in that row are fully sourced by reliable citations. I've tagged a few today for cleanup. N2e (talk) 11:14, 5 May 2021 (UTC)

There are more problems here, but leaving two general thoughts:

  • in all cases, we cannot use sources that say something is slated to happen (an upcoming launch article) to say something actually did happen
  • nextspaceflight.com is a fun website on upcoming launches; but it is not a reliable secondary source on launches that have happened. Moreover, the published of that website might very well list "success" after a launch, but that cannot support the wiki tables two columns of "Success" statements: one for launch and another for landing.
Not every single piece of information needs a dedicated reference. Not in a normal article, and not in a list either. Sure, it's nicer to have them, but it's not a strict requirement. Especially if the information is uncontroversial and/or can be found in a general reference for that mission in the same row. If you want to see everything cited explicitly then maybe you should add these citations. They are easy to find. Often they are already in the article and you just didn't check them. --mfb (talk) 13:06, 5 May 2021 (UTC)
That's not correct, mfb; I did check the sources in those several rows before I added the very specific cleanup tags. Of course, I might have made a mistake and missed something; and happy to have you show me that. That I was correct is already shown by another editor having already added several mainline space media sources from after the particular launch occurred to remedy sourcing discrepancies.
But in the main, the sloppy sourcing on many statements made on many rows of this list is a quite true description of a problem in this article, and it does not appear that any of the regular editors of this article, who would seem to have built a consensus that all of these detailed facts be kept in the article, have chosen to do a simple verification, say, a week after each launch is "in the books." It is this latter step that would make this a good and factual article over the long term, 5 to 50 years out, where the "facts" claimed are actually sourced. Cheers. N2e (talk) 15:31, 5 May 2021 (UTC)
Feels like you are calling out "regular editors" for failing to live up to your expectations. I, for one, make edits as time permits as I see things that are not incorporated in the article or may be out of date. I do appreciate what you are getting at, what your goal is. Just be careful that a failure of action on an editor's part does not necessarily mean that she/he agrees with what has remained or that there is consensus.  DGrundler  talk  21:57, 5 May 2021 (UTC)

[15] seems to show we do need to check facts launch time was 2:19 not 2:33. I have added a few date and time refs which were missing. I do usually try to add refs from after launch for the date and time but I don't usually leave it a week. Going back over them all to check for dead links is tedious be might be a good idea if we want to keep it good for long term. C-randles (talk) 14:42, 23 May 2021 (UTC)

Requested move 28 May 2021

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Not moved. (non-admin closure) Natg 19 (talk) 02:16, 4 June 2021 (UTC)


List of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches → List of Falcon 9 launches – During a recent requested move discussion for List of Falcon 9 first-stage boosters, a consensus was formed that the differences between the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy aren't significant enough for "Falcon Heavy" to appear in the title of the article. One of the opposing arguments even brought up a source in which SpaceX describes the Falcon Heavy's core and side stages as "three Falcon 9 first stages with enhancements provided to strengthen the cores." This is very much contradictory to this article's title, List of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches, and previous discussions which asserted that the differences between the two vehicles are sufficent enough for "Falcon Heavy" to be in the title. So, re-litigating this issue at the expense of yet another requested move discussion on this page, I'd like to find some sort of consensus as to which of these two contradicting and mutually exclusive ideas should be accepted going forward, for the sake of WP:TITLECON. — Molly Brown (talk) 05:20, 28 May 2021 (UTC)

I'm pinging the participants of the aforementioned move discussion, Ng.j, Mfb, AmigaClone, StarshipSLS, C-randles, and Dgrundler, to hopefully provide their thoughts on the matter. — Molly Brown (talk) 05:26, 28 May 2021 (UTC)

Strong oppose - Molly, did you read the discussion in the other move post on why that one was specifically different from this one? If you read that discussion I fail to see why you think this article should be moved. It's even more incorrect to move this one than to move the other one. Your summarization of the consensus isn't even remotely correct. Please refer to the previous discussion and I suggest you immediately close this move request. Ergzay (talk) 07:16, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
@The Unsinkable Molly Brown: I'll further explain as you seem to be confused. Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy are completely independent vehicles. However, both vehicles share a number of components. For Falcon Heavy the two side boosters are, at least previously, interchangeable with the first stages of Falcon 9. Boosters that originally flew on Falcon 9 were converted into Falcon Heavy side boosters, and it's possible the reverse will happen in the future. The second stage of Falcon Heavy is also shared with Falcon 9. And the design of the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy first stages are given serial numbers that are in sequential order with each other. However, they are still considered independent rockets as the center core of the Falcon Heavy is strengthened compared to the normal Falcon 9, despite being numbered sequentially with Falcon 9. Additionally Falcon Heavy has additional features such as retracting attachment points to connect to the nosecones of the Falcon Heavy side boosters. So Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy boosters need to be listed on the same page given the sequential numbering, but they are still all Falcon 9 boosters and are labeled as such. These two pages are two fundamentally different lists and should not be consistent with each other. One is a list of missions, the other is a list of uses of hardware. Ergzay (talk) 07:27, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
@Ergzay: I appreciate your thoughts on the matter, but I don't understand why you have to be so disrespectful about it. Not a single editor in the discussion made any direct comparison to List of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches, nor made any argument as to why the two articles are different. All anybody wrote on the matter was how different the two launch vehicles are, and that's it. What on Earth else was I suppose to surmise other than what was literally written on the page in order for me to be exempt from your passive-aggressive first reply? — Molly Brown (talk) 08:42, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
@The Unsinkable Molly Brown: I wasn't disrespectful anywhere. No one else did, but you argued they were the same and the entire conversation was in that context. Ergzay (talk) 09:51, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
@Ergzay: Your entire first reply essentially told me in no substantive matter whatsoever that I didn't read, that I was wrong, and thus I should just close this discussion. That's pretty disrespectful. You could've just scrapped that entire reply and just went straight to your perfectly fine and well-reasoned second reply instead, and everything would've been fine. It costs zero dollars to be nice to others. — Molly Brown (talk) 10:00, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
Oppose renaming this article to 'List of Falcon 9 launches'. I would propose as an alternative to have an article similar to List of Ariane launches named 'List of Falcon launches' containing a list of the entire Falcon family split into three decades:
  • List of Falcon launches 2000-2009 (Falcon 1 launches);
  • List of Falcon launches 2010-2019 (Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches);
  • List of Falcon launches 2020-2029 (Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches);
That would be consistent with some other lists of launches of a rocket ′family′. It could even be argued that the Falcon 1 has more in common with the Falcon Heavy than the Ariane 1 has with Ariane 5. — Preceding unsigned comment added by AmigaClone (talk • contribs) 09:18, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
Oppose The boosters are similar, the entire rocket is not. C-randles (talk) 10:50, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
Strongly Oppose It has been asserted that “consensus was formed that the differences between the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy aren't significant enough for "Falcon Heavy" to appear in the title of the article“. I see no such consensus. C-randles and Ergzay are correct about the nomenclature. Ng.j (talk) 13:21, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
@Ng.j: But you, C-randles, and Dgrundler opposed the move and cited Falcon Heavy being similar enough to the Falcon 9 as a reason why the page shouldn't be moved to include "Falcon Heavy" in the title. Surely you can see why I feel like I'm being slightly gaslighted here. — Molly Brown (talk) 05:31, 29 May 2021 (UTC)
As already explained by others above, rockets and boosters are not the same thing. --mfb (talk) 06:28, 29 May 2021 (UTC)
@The Unsinkable Molly Brown: I think I understand your confusion now. When we talk about Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy first stage boosters, we are discussing them as components and they are essentially the same. However, when we talk about Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy as launch vehicles, we are talking about a system. Very different applications. Think of it like cars: some cars have the same engines and parts in common. However, they are still different vehicles. Hope this clears it up for you.Ng.j (talk) 05:37, 30 May 2021 (UTC)
Strong Oppose - Falcon Heavy does not have many launches and should be kept with the Falcon 9 launches in one article. StarshipSLS (Talk), (My Contributions) 14:22, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
Oppose. Completely different situation. Candidate for SNOW close. --mfb (talk) 23:47, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
Oppose - Sorry folks, but I am late to the party on this one. Hope you all enjoyed a long weekend (for our US-based editors). I agree that the confusion spurred from the difference between launch systems vs boosters. I thought that was a very good analogy that Ng.j used with regard to car parts. To further that analogy, it is like the Ford Taurus and the Ford Explorer. When referring to the system, those are two clearly different vehicles; but when referring to the chassis on which they are built (the D3, and now D4), they are identical underneath. List of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches is referring to the launch vehicle systems which are different, but List of Falcon 9 first-stage boosters is referring to the component booster for various launch systems, which is the same. While I see this from both sides, I can also see why Molly Brown felt like she was being gas-lighted. I've read enough from all of these editors in question to know that is not their intent, but intent can be hard to gather from Internet posts. I think we all appreciate Molly Brown's attempt at bettering these articles, and I certainly appreciate the move to discuss.  DGrundler  talk  17:10, 1 June 2021 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Worldview Legion 1 & 2

[16] suggests "The initial block of the multi-satellite WorldView Legion constellation will be launched by two flight-proven Falcon 9 rockets in 2021." i.e. seems clear it is 2 launches. We and [17] seem to follow this with 1 launch in Oct/Q4 2021 and second in Jan 2022. A potentially different view can be seen on [18] which has "WorldView Legion 1 & 2" on one launch in Q4 2021.

I am more inclined to believe Spaceflightnow: 1 launch for 2 satellites because of Maxar results p25 says "We recently have encountered certain issues with component suppliers and subsystems related to our WorldView legion satellite constellation, which could lead to launch and service delays from our expected timetable. We continue to anticipate a second half of 2021 launch date for our first two WorldView legion satellites, but anticipate that these issues likely will push the launch into the fourth quarter of this year." The launch appears to be singular and two satellites on that launch. However, even fully believing that as the likely most reliable source, it is possible that there are still two launches (with the second mission presumably launching satellites 3 and 4 Edit: second mission to launch 4 satelites numbers 3,4,5 and 6 per Gunters Space Page ).

Anyone got any better info to clarify?

If not, do we 1. Change to Worldview Legion 1 & 2 for the Q4 2021 launch or leave it as Mission 1?
2. Delete the second Worldview Legion launch? Change second one to Worldview Legion 3, 4, 5, & 6? C-randles (talk) 14:21, 6 July 2021 (UTC)

Guess my Edit above and on page pretty much sorts this out, unless anyone disagrees. C-randles (talk) 14:42, 6 July 2021 (UTC)

Total cargo launched

Is this article, or anywhere else in WP, the place to have a running total of cargo (excluding Dragon capsules) launched (into orbit) on Falcon rockets ? It probably should leave out the empty mass of Dragon capsules, and the unknown mass of classified payloads. - Rod57 (talk) 13:26, 15 July 2021 (UTC)

Total launch count 3 higher than higher launch number

Why in Launch statistics does it say 126 launches, but the table of launches starts at 1 and ends at 123 ? (both counts exclude the Amos-6 pre-launch loss, and the table of launches includes the Falcon Heavy launches). - Rod57 (talk) 10:45, 5 August 2021 (UTC)

It clearly says Falcon 9 family launches 126. The table goes to 123 Falcon 9 launches but there is also three Falcon Heavy launches numbered FH1, FH2 and FH3 in the table. C-randles (talk) 11:25, 5 August 2021 (UTC)
Thanks @C-randles:, Silly me for not seeing the FH1 numbering in the table. - Rod57 (talk) 18:19, 5 August 2021 (UTC)

Booster reuse counts don't seem to add up

Why in Launch statistics does it say 41 booster reflights (maybe of just 103 Full Thrust (including Block 5), and excluding Falcon Heavy), but the block graph of Rocket configurations shows (when mouse-over) 12 reuses of Full thrust (excluding block 5?) and 52 reuses of Block 5 (separate from FH) which would be a total of 64 (excluding FH) ? SpaceX often report on number of recoveries and reuses so why not reference their figures ?- Rod57 (talk) 11:15, 5 August 2021 (UTC)

Looks like that 41 is well out of date. Given 2 were converted from Falcon 9 to FH side boosters, I think for 'booster reflights' we should be including falcon heavy reflights. That would make the current number 14 block 4 reflights, + 52 block 5 not on falcon heavy + 2 falcon heavy cores on one FH launch = 68. That seems to agree with [19] so I will change to that. C-randles (talk) 11:46, 5 August 2021 (UTC)
Thanks @C-randles:, & [20] was a great link. - Rod57 (talk) 18:29, 5 August 2021 (UTC)
Also added comment at Template_talk:Falcon_rocket_statistics#New_Statistics to see if we can get it updated via there. Not sure if I should put thet there or here so am mention it at both places. C-randles (talk) 12:18, 5 August 2021 (UTC)
Done. Generally the template is the right place but I follow the talk page here, too. --mfb (talk) 13:20, 5 August 2021 (UTC)

Boosters with a .1 suffix

First second flight of a booster was 30 March 2017, B1021.2. Before then, I don't think we knew about the decimal suffix and boosters that flew before that and which weren't reused after that date should not have the .1 added to them. There is also question: if first flight is expended, does booster get a .1 suffix? Less sure about this one. Any differing opinion before I remove the pre 30 March 2017 .1s? C-randles (talk) 15:40, 27 August 2021 (UTC)

I prefer removing it for everything that didn't fly again, accident or not. --mfb (talk) 16:20, 27 August 2021 (UTC)
So does that mean a new booster doesn't get a .1 until we know it is scheduled to fly for second time? Is there evidence for SpaceX doing that? If SpaceX uses a .1 for a new booster flight, I would be more inclined to say we should too and keep it even if first booster landing fails. C-randles (talk) 18:13, 27 August 2021 (UTC)

why it is green and not blue?--Dwalin (talk) 10:44, 10 September 2021 (UTC)

It's somewhere between green and blue ("DarkCyan"). If you find a color scheme that separates successful and planned launches better while being color-blind compatible we can change it. --mfb (talk) 00:09, 11 September 2021 (UTC)
we can reuse a blue used elsewhere. MediumBlue
the colour scheme might be: "dark light other-dark" in sense of green and blue.
Black : DarkRed : Goldenrod : ForestGreen : MediumAquamarine : DarkGreen : MediumBlue : LightBlue : MidnightBlue
--Dwalin (talk) 07:35, 15 September 2021 (UTC)

LDPE-2 not Tetra-1

User:Chinakpradhan has replaced Tetra-1 with LDPE-2. The ref now provided doesn't seem to indicate the launch vehicle or mission. [21] suggests this is flying on Atlas-5 in 2022. There is a comment on the ref saying "Wouldn't it be funny if they had to use SpaceX for the launch because Vulcan wasn't ready and all the Atlas Vs were spoken for?" LDPE-2 is cubesat so likely a rideshare so the comment seems more supportive of it being an Atlas-5 launch to me. So I think we need a further ref to say it is flying on the USSF-44 mission. Perhaps this part is in the other undefined ref? Tetra-1 does have a ref specifically saying it is flying on the USSF-44 mission, so why is this being removed? Also in undefined ref? C-randles (talk) 18:26, 19 September 2021 (UTC)

Found and added what I assume to be the intended ref [22]. Tetra payloads designed to be able to be launched by LDPE and similar payload adapters per [23] so it seems likely that Tetra-1 is one of the 6 payloads and LINUSS two more leaving 3 undefined payloads. C-randles (talk) 13:01, 21 September 2021 (UTC)

Split by decade

Has been discussed before at Talk:List_of_Falcon_9_and_Falcon_Heavy_launches/Archive_9#eventual_split. I thought not yet back then, however we now have 26 launches in 2020 and 4 in 2021 and the future launch entries also number 40 + 20 + 9 =69 so 99 table entries is more than 81 (77 +3 FH + 1 non launch) for up to 2019. So new article has more table entries and that seems big enough. The graphs can go on both articles easily enough. Not sure about notable launches: Should each article have:

  1. Only the notable launches in the decade the article concerns, or
  2. Both article have all notable launches (presumably a template), or
  3. Both articles just have a link to a list of all notable launches
  4. Something else

Any thoughts on this or any other matters? crandles (talk) 15:03, 4 February 2021 (UTC)

I still don't understand why this should be split. You can scroll the page as far as you want if it is in one, but you would have to switch beween pages if it is split. This only add inconvinience, but does not provide any value. Gial Ackbar (talk) 16:04, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
We could ad the mw-collapsed option to the tables. --Robertiki (talk) 17:56, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
Personally with the large table size, editing the article; especially in the VirtualEditor is hard (loading, glitching, lag). OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 18:16, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
Another issue is that Wikipedia has a limit on table size, which is why the 2021 in spaceflight article was split into three (a main one, January-June 2021 launches and July-December 2021 launches. It would likely be easier to do the split before hitting that limit. AmigaClone (talk) 00:23, 20 February 2021 (UTC)
would be cool if someone with article-creation privileges would start that move, so non-registered editors can contribute. 205.175.106.86 (talk) 22:11, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Now seeing lots of refs saying " The time allocated for running scripts has expired". Is this some specific problem, or a size limit by way of time to deal with large number of refs being reached or something else? Do we need to start splitting article? By decade or put notable launches in their own article or something else? C-randles (talk) 13:09, 15 May 2021 (UTC)

I would suggest going ahead with the split by decade. I would be fine with some notable launches mentioned in the main article. Besides the first launch of each version, I would include the first time a Cargo Dragon was berthed to the ISS (SpaceX COTS Demo 2+), CRS-7, first successful landing, SpaceX Crew Demo 2, and maybe first time a booster landed 10 times. AmigaClone (talk) 21:18, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

Move the tables only? Or tables and notable launches section? Move both decades to new articles, or move only 2010-2019 and keep 2020+ here? Or move both, but then transclude the 2020+ table? Having the recent and future launches here is less consistent in terms of article structure but reduces the spread of information (and update work) over multiple articles. --mfb (talk) 01:47, 5 June 2021 (UTC)

I would like to hear some feedback from others in the community. Personally, for now I would separate out the tables of the 2010-2019 launches, possibly with a version reflecting the stats of the decade of the first three paragraphs in this article as an intro for the new one. As for 2020+ launches I can see advantages either way. If the consensus is to to keep the 2020+ launches here, I would suggest that be viewed as a temporary measure until either the article becomes unmanageable, we start seeing launch dates in 2030 or beyond, or SpaceX retires the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy. AmigaClone (talk) 22:59, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

Personally I'm against splitting the page and if there's problems with some editing programs that people use (I always edit using the default built-in editor on the site) then there should be bugs filed against the editing programs. The articles shouldn't conform to the bugs of editing programs. If we do absolutely want to split the article (again, I'm against), then I think just the tables for 2010-2019 should be split off and be linked to from this page and 2020+ and everything else should be kept on this page. Ergzay (talk) 10:18, 15 September 2021 (UTC)

If we're going to split the article, I'd rather split it by leaving this as a summary article, and moving the tables themselves to separate articles by decade. Section headers of "2010-2019" and "2020-present" can then be left here, with the sole content of those sections being a link to the table articles. The summary of notable launches and the summary graphs could still be kept on this page, rather than bogging down the launch table pages. This needs to be done because this article is unwieldy and starting to get difficult to parse, not because the content is bad (it's great IMO). But regardless of the details we'll need a summary article, so it might as well be this one. — Gopher65talk 21:51, 9 October 2021 (UTC)

Splitting of government and commercial in statistics not possible

The splitting of government and commercial in statistics is not possible. I don't know why this split was done, but the differentiation of what is a government launch and what is a commercial launch is not information that is public. Launches of government satellites can be competed commercially from countries that don't have indigenous launch vehicles. Additionally launches can be competed commercially but limited to US launch vehicles. Thus I'm reverting the chart. Do you have any objection Jadebenn? There's several glaring mistakes already that show this. For example calling the SpaceX launch of the Dragon spacecraft qualification unit a "commercial" launch is false because it wasn't competed commercially.

The split was originally done such that there was two categories, "planned (starlink)" and "planned (commercial and military)", success was all lumped together with starlink and non-starlink together. I then split the Success section into starlink success and regular successes. Some time later I later reorganized it and turned it from "commercial and military" to "commercial and government" as that more accurately conveyed all the missions. I also relabeled "Success" into "Success (commercial and government)".

If this split is really wanted, we first need a definition of what is a commercial launch, what is government launch, and every launch needs a source stating what it is. Otherwise it's all just WP:OR.

Ergzay (talk) 09:42, 15 September 2021 (UTC)

I think it's pretty clear-cut. Anything with a government agency (foreign or domestic) payload counts as "government." Anything that's procured by a corporation - whether it's state-owned, public, or private - is commercial. Still, if you want to go for an even more objective standard (unnecessary in my view), you could literally look at whether a launch is under NSSL or CRS, and alter the category names slightly to reflect that this only separates out those particular government programs. – Jadebenn (talk · contribs · subpages) 23:26, 15 September 2021 (UTC)
Actually no, if it's a foreign government launch, but competed commercially it very much could be considered a commercial launch. What is commercial is tricky to define. Commercial launch can be determined by if it's competed openly to anyone. Ergzay (talk) 01:31, 19 September 2021 (UTC)
I think it's a stretch to say it's OR by default to classify which launches are paid for by the government versus by a private company. As jadebenn said, there are certain government programs that have spoken for large swaths of launches. I think the government/commercial split makes sense personally, and I think it matches an important distinction that I've seen when reading about these launches. Leijurv (talk) 23:48, 15 September 2021 (UTC)
@Ergzay: Fair warning: If you don't respond I'm going to consider the matter settled and restore the changes. – Jadebenn (talk · contribs · subpages) 17:45, 17 September 2021 (UTC)
The purpose of splitting out starlink seems clear, SpaceX don't get paid (well not in advance anyway) for Starlink. With government and commercial, how do you deal with a transporter mission that has 90 total satellites but say 6 government satellite that may be paying 40% of SpaceX's income from the flight and 30% of the mass? Does that count as .4 government .6 commercial based on income, or 30% government 70% commercial based on mass to orbit, or 6% government based on number of satellites, or 100% commercial based on majority of satellites/income/mass being commercial. Are ELaNa missions government? Where do we stop? Should we also split out military and scientific and ... The more we split out the harder any apportionments become. Anyway, what is the point is splitting government from commercial they get paid contracted amounts for either. If there was some interesting angle with RSs' pointing out how SpaceX does better / worse with government contracts then perhaps I could see some point. Without that it seem a bit meh why bother? C-randles (talk) 19:51, 17 September 2021 (UTC)
As war as I remember, the main reeason for splitting of Starlink launches was that SpaceX is not bound to those launches by any contracts and can delay them as they want. SO any future Starlink launches are not as clear as other launches. But this difference does nox exist between commercial and government launches. SpaceX has launch contracts in both cases. So I see no reason to keep those split. Gial Ackbar (talk) 19:57, 17 September 2021 (UTC)
I've already proposed an alternative standard, since NSSL and CRS launches would make up the vast majority of government launches and would be unambiguous. I think seeing how much of SpaceX's business is with commercial entities and how much is under long-term government contracts is notable enough to be worth displaying. – Jadebenn (talk · contribs · subpages) 17:39, 18 September 2021 (UTC)
"Vast majority" isn't really good enough. It needs to be precise and ideally unambiguous for all launched missions. And I still maintain that for some missions under many standards it's going to be impossible to determine as we don't have access to the contracts. And finally this really doesn't get us anything. Even splitting out Starlink from the rest is honestly open for debate but I liked the idea as the Starlink launches distort the launch statistics. Splitting commercial from government doesn't really do anything. Ergzay (talk) 01:54, 19 September 2021 (UTC)
I was the one who did the split of Starlink launches from the other launches (though somoene else split the (planned)) portion. The reason I did it was because Starlink are self-launched missions not for anyone else other than SpaceX. They also disort the statistics. For example BryceTech's reports also splits out starlink in their yearly launch industry review https://brycetech.com/reports . If you want a source for government vs commercial, they're the only ones I know of who try. Ergzay (talk) 01:35, 19 September 2021 (UTC)
With government and commercial, how do you deal with a transporter mission that has 90 total satellites but say 6 government satellite that may be paying 40% of SpaceX's income from the flight and 30% of the mass? This is already a problem with the status quo. See [24] as an example. What percent of this is Starlink? Do we go by mass or by payload volume or by monetary value? So I don't think that's a valid concern because it applies to Starlink / non-Starlink as much as government / commercial. Leijurv (talk) 23:07, 18 September 2021 (UTC)
So far SpaceX has only launched test satellites on rideshare missions like that. Starlink page doesn't even include the Transporter-* missions in the counted numbering of missions in the list of Starlink launches. So we're consistent here at least. Ergzay (talk) 01:38, 19 September 2021 (UTC)
Which in [25] were tests? It looks to me like operational starlink satellites, and operational planet labs earth imaging satellites? Leijurv (talk) 08:02, 19 September 2021 (UTC)
@Jadebenn Also, FYI. I usually only check Wikipedia messages once every week or two. Ergzay (talk) 01:55, 19 September 2021 (UTC)
Do you have a source that defines what is commercial and what is not? It's OR otherwise. Ergzay (talk) 01:33, 19 September 2021 (UTC)
That's a silly and pedantic thing to say. Sources clearly indicate that NSSL and CRS are Space Force and NASA programs respectively, and NASA is part of the federal government. (and especially since this was already said above) Leijurv (talk) 06:05, 19 September 2021 (UTC)
Splitting government and commercial launches, as well as being difficult to define, would be inconsistent. List of launches by other vehicles (Atlas, Soyuz, etc.) do not make that distinction. In the case of splitting Starlink versus other payloads, I don't think it's inconsistent, because SpaceX unique in being the only company which launches its own satellites. Fcrary (talk) 18:17, 18 September 2021 (UTC)
Wouldn't the Russian government launching its own astronauts on Soyuz also sort of count? Like Starlink, as a launch provider launching its "own stuff"? Like if Roscosmos launches on its own?
It doesn't have to be difficult to define, there is a current objective metric of "is this a NSSL or CRS launch" that jadebenn suggested. Leijurv (talk) 23:22, 18 September 2021 (UTC)
As far as consistency with other lists and articles is concerned, that would argue for less discrimination between different sorts of Falcon launches. If you think separating Starlink and non-Starlink launches is a mistake, we can talk about that. But this discussion is about further separating different sorts of Falcon 9 launches. That would be inconsistent with other lists and articles about other launch vehicles.
As a Featured List, this article should be held to higher standards and not be held back by the inferior Soyuz launch list that does not indicate which launches are commercial or government. (I'm half joking 😀😀😀😀) Leijurv (talk) 06:07, 19 September 2021 (UTC)
Answering your statement seriously even though you're half joking: I think if we resort to Original Research (forbidden by Wikipedia policies) to determine which launches are commercial and which launches are not, then I think the article doesn't deserve being listed as a Featured List. Ergzay (talk) 17:55, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
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