About 30 or 40 seconds after separation, video came back and could watch upper-stage video for a bit longer - that was neato.

Glad to see it go up!

Did you notice the large pressure wave around the payload section when it went through mach. Pretty cool!

Ummm, where is the video????

Here is a link with nice picture: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8330424.stm

There may be video at this link but not sure - I watched it on MSNBC:
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/constellation/ares/flighttests/aresIx/index.html

Oh hey - the BBC has the video now instead of the cool picture.

Pretty cool how they dump all that H2O, seen at 10-12 seconds into the video (while the rocket is still on the the pad...) They do that for the shuttle, too - it is for sound abatement. Seems like I read once that it wasn't for keeping the area quiet, but it was for keeping the harmonics from destroying the pad?

I'm always amazed at how fast these things pitch over. Amazing.

Was that Doug G's camera on board? 😉

John, I always thought it was just to cut the roar down, but it could be for resonance as well. Ken, you're right, that trip thru Mach was cool. At least, they must have dampened the resonance of the solid prop motors. They used to resonate and blow up in static tests... I think? I just can't believe we only have 6 shuttle launches left... then 2015 for the Ares and Orion, plus the equipment booster? Am I missing something... besides a couple of years of the US not being able to fly?

very nice video. If you want to capture it, download ANT and you can....

I found these on YouTube, and I haven't seen these since I was a kid in the very early 60's. Follow the whole sequence. It's amazing how things have and haven't changed, and how far we've come... and how far we have yet to go.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75vX6O8paGo&feature=related

Checked the date, 1959, ten years before we actually landed on the moon. I was six, so probably didn't remember it until it was re-run in the early 60's. Or maybe I did... 😉

I wish I could fly to 32 miles just going through mach 4... Odd design their testing "The 100m-tall, syringe-like rocket" pretty much sums it up.

The 1080i HD version of the video is up on the NASA website now.
http://anon.nasa-global.edgesuite.net/qt.nasa-global/ksc/ksc_102909_aresIx_launch_1080.mov

This picture's pretty awesome too:

That has a picture of the water bags John mentioned that are used for sound. Picture from http://twitter.com/flyingjenny

Hey, Art, Joe and Troy used a kiddie pool under Event Horizon. 8)

John, I always thought it was just to cut the roar down, but it could be for resonance as well. Ken, you're right, that trip thru Mach was cool. At least, they must have dampened the resonance of the solid prop motors. They used to resonate and blow up in static tests... I think? I just can't believe we only have 6 shuttle launches left... then 2015 for the Ares and Orion, plus the equipment booster? Am I missing something... besides a couple of years of the US not being able to fly?

what you're missing is that our space program is LAME. if we could go to the moon in the 60's w/out breaking the bank, why can't we do it now?