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My guess is September.
I wonder if a successful catch will be what accelerates the launch schedule.
I hope a failed catch doesn’t mean a six month pause…
They’ve got a decent start on building a second tower. So even a catastrophic failure would hopefully not set them back that much.
A booster at the end of flight has way less explosive potential than the stack waiting for flight. The vast majority of fuel will have been expended. Plus it should be coasting toward a spot out at sea. For it to actually make contact with the tower should mean it already slowed down and has maintained control.
In the Everyday Astronaut starbase tour, Musk mentions how the chopstick arms that are installed on the tower are longer and heavier than they want. They already have replacement arms that are ready to be installed, it just isn’t a high priority item at the moment. So if the catch attempt damages the arms but leaves the rest of the infrastructure in serviceable condition, they’ll be back to operational capability in short order.
Great points. I think my concern is that a failed catch has the potential to look very dramatic, even if nothing significant goes wrong. I worry that a lengthy investigation will be triggered. But admittedly I don’t know how that process works!
