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A comment on China Has Three Reusable Rockets Ready for Their Debut Flights. Parent comment

Re:China Has Three Reusable Rockets Ready for Their Debut Fl... by mschuster91 on Wednesday November 26, 2025 @02:29PM (#46061411)
What use is the stuff that went on 60 years in the past when most people involved with it are dead and a lot of the knowledge has been lost in the meantime?
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Re:China Has Three Reusable Rockets Ready for Their Debut Fl... by delusional on Wednesday November 26, 2025 @02:34PM (#46061459)
I don't necessarily think the knowledge is lost, but the second system effect sure is in full swing.
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Re:China Has Three Reusable Rockets Ready for Their Debut Fl... by JumpCrisscross on Wednesday November 26, 2025 @02:43PM (#46061536)
It isn’t lost. But it’s decaying.

I remember picking through an aerospace scrapyard in North Hollywood a decade ago with extremely-talented launch engineers (and entrepreneurs). The aim was to look at parts, measure them and figure out why they were built like they were. We looked, a little, at stuff like nozzles. But mostly we focussed on bolts, joiners, turbine blades and the like.

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Re:China Has Three Reusable Rockets Ready for Their Debut Fl... by Koala_ice on Wednesday November 26, 2025 @03:02PM (#46061729)
That sounds like living amongst the ruins of the Roman Empire
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Re:China Has Three Reusable Rockets Ready for Their Debut Fl... by JumpCrisscross on Wednesday November 26, 2025 @03:56PM (#46062219)
> sounds like living amongst the ruins of the Roman Empire

Down to the fact that the Eastern Roman Empire was going strong.

Even in 2014, when I was in North Hollywood, SpaceX was carrying the torch.

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