Perhaps not, but I do find it telling that all the landing failures so far have been trying to land on the ship, where every landing on the ground attempted has succeeded
S= Success F = failure
Ship FFFFSSSFSSSSSSSSSF
Land SSSSSSSSSSS
Its logically going to be harder, Smaller area, platform moving up and down in the swell, much faster wind ( double the wind speed = 8x the wind force)
This seems to also point to the most failures being near the start of the learning curve for landing in general. Without a barge, the whole Ship category would simply be lost boosters.
It's also something of a two-for-one, as being good enough to land on a barge means being good enough to land on a land platform.
At least one of the ship failures was a landing SpaceX knew was a probable failure, as the fuel reserve from the launch was below safety margins. The cities and launch centers on land appreciate not having that kind of boundary pushed. The level of experimentation is likely higher because the stakes for such attempts are much lower over water, where spent stages are traditionally expected to land in.
Also I dont know but I'm thinking all that sea water over the rocket means it needs a good clean afterwards before its reused
Impact with salt water and immersion, sure. A ship means some salt spray and external dripping that isn't going to climb up into the engines or tanks. A booster was quoted as being ~$60 million (edit: Falcon 9 cost, first stage estimated elsewhere at about half that) a few years back, saving it seems like it can go through the car wash at least twice before it becomes unprofitable.
The margin of fewer crashes may only be a few % points, but you've gotten also factor in the extra payload you'll be able to launch.
A booster stage costs tens of millions of dollars, while fuel costs several hundred thousand. It's the outsized cost of the booster and the need to reuse it that underpins the business model of SpaceX.
At the same time, limiting the rocket only to orbits achievable with its existing land-based pads would cut out all those launches with ship landings.
Sure if they were only planning to go to space a few times its prolly not worthwhile looking at a better place than Florida but Space X are looking to go to mars, they're gonna have to do a shitton of launches
That would be up to SpaceX when it gets to the point that it can afford to build its own Mars program (and own space industrial complex?). Getting to that point, and accumulating the necessary technology and resources had to use what was available.
The BFR appears to be slated for returning to the launch pad, though that is a future plan and wouldn't be possible without the testing and business enabled by the current launch profile.
Bingo, ideally they don't want to land at sea yet they are forced to because of the poor choice of choosing Florida(*) and thats why it's better to choose a place where they can land on the land like Australia
Does Australia sport the infrastructure and client list offered by NASA and the US government/military/agencies?
Even then, there would be incentives, or requirements to keep it on the coast.
Governments tend to be more controlling of launch trajectories over land, and some cargoes like radioactive power sources can be objected to rather strongly.
There's also some flexibility for launch track problems over water versus land, depending on how much room there is before the rocket must be destroyed.
A recent equator-launched Ariane flight was at the threshold of being remotely destroyed, since its over-water track deviated significantly.
http://spacenews.com/satellites-pla...bits-by-ariane-5-can-be-recovered-owners-say/
It's potentially the case that even with the safety corridor offered for the over-water route that the rocket may have gone past safety limits. I read stories indicating it may have been so off-course that it might have overflown an inhabited area.
Even if there's enough mostly uninhabited land, that doesn't remove the utility of proximity to infrastructure, port access, industry, and clients. The outback doesn't quite provide those, but the cities on the coast and their ports do.
Water recovery also has a nice property of combining landing site flexibility (one barge, many launch trajectories and landing points) and shipping (flexible transportation routes of a 25.6 metric ton explosive and chemical hazard with no train schedules or highway blockages).
The only pro argument I see for staying at florida is 'The infrastructure is there already' all other pro's are in the 'move the launch place camp'
That's a pretty huge one, and even if handled it doesn't rule out using ocean recovery. SpaceX is not capable of funding that level of investment or operating costs on its own, and the US has an established world-class local space industry.
(*)I could understand it during the cold war, you want to have it part of the continent USA and it being a government organization etc, but this is 2018 and its a private organization
The US-based organization is using US infrastructure, US contracts, and can carry US satellites. The particulars of the satellites matter as well. If a satellite cannot leave the US, a SpaceX launch pad elsewhere is out of the question.
