True but disingenuous. This statement is often used to mock blue origin for just going 100km straight up into space and then back down, which is very far from reaching orbit. But the flight profile of IFT-3 was so close to orbital velocity, it’s not a significant difference.
It is a significant difference. When it comes to orbit, there is no close enough, either you’re going fast enough or you’re not. They have not shown this thing can do what they say it can.
IFT-3 was completely empty and the tanks were full. Where is the weight of the crew decks, the solar panels and batteries, life support equipment, docking mechanism, food, water, and cargo? These are not trivial things, and they weigh a lot. Proving an empty shell can achieve a suborbital flight and be just barely not be in orbit is not proof of anything useful.
If they had shown there was a significant amount of delta-v left with this empty test article, then that’s one thing. But those tanks had a whisper of fuel left in them. I don’t believe for a second that it would have gotten that close when it was full of over a hundred tons of additional equipment.
I can’t say I know enough about the subject to agree or disagree in general, it seems pretty clear to me that these people are sore about the fact that the billion (trillion?) dollar corporation they pathetically stan for didn’t make it to orbit.
Like I think it really gets to them.
