Failure To Launch – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

Technical and general information from the podcast's RSS feed.

Failure To Launch

Failure To Launch Podcast

Leisure

Frequency: 1 episode/14d. Total Eps: 131

This is a podcast about all the mistakes, failures, and explosions that made space exploration possible.

Site

RSS

Apple

Data updated on 08/10/2026

Recent rankings

Latest chart positions across Apple Podcasts and Spotify rankings.

Apple Podcasts

🇨🇦 Canada - Aviation
08/10/2026
#14
🇬🇧 Great Britain - Aviation
08/10/2026
#56
🇩🇪 Germany - Aviation
08/10/2026
#46
🇺🇸 USA - Aviation
08/10/2026
#13
🇫🇷 France - Aviation
08/10/2026
#70
🇨🇦 Canada - Aviation
07/10/2026
#9
🇬🇧 Great Britain - Aviation
07/10/2026
#88
🇩🇪 Germany - Aviation
07/10/2026
#38
🇺🇸 USA - Aviation
07/10/2026
#20
🇫🇷 France - Aviation
07/10/2026
#67

Spotify

No recent rankings available

Shared links between episodes and podcasts

Links found in episode descriptions and other podcasts that share them.

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https://failuretolaunch.bigcartel.com/
16 shares
https://www.russianspaceweb.com/soyuz1.html
3 shares
https://russiatrek.org/blog/art/propaganda-posters-of-soviet-space-program-1958-1963/
3 shares

https://www.patreon.com/failuretolaunch
50 shares
https://www.patreon.com/c/failuretolaunch

RSS feed quality and score

Technical evaluation of the podcast's RSS feed quality and structure.

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RSS feed quality

To improve

Score global : 38%

Publication history

Monthly episode publishing history over the past years.

Year

Latest published episodes

Recent episodes with titles, durations, and descriptions.

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The Trial of Georg Rickhey

Wednesday, October 7, 2026 • Duration 01:10:04

In 1947, Georg Rickhey, General Director of Mittelwerk, was charged with war crimes. He was acquitted for lack of evidence.Today, Quinn and Chris are talking about Operation Paperclip and the deliberate efforts made by its staff to protect post-war Nazis from justice and war crimes trials (conducted by other US military officers).

Find our merch store here

Support FTL on Patreon to unlock bonus content and join our Discord community

SOURCES:

- Secret Agenda: The United States Government, Nazi Scientists, and Project Paperclip, 1945–1990, Linda Hunt

- The Rocket and the Reich, Michael Neufeld

- A History of the Dora Camp, Andre Sellier

FTL theme song by DJ Danarchy

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*PREVIEW* Ulysses 1994XF04 (Ace Combat)

Wednesday, September 30, 2026 • Duration 16:24

This is a preview of a bonus episode. To hear the rest of the episode and unlock more bonus content, support Failure To Launch on Patreon at any tier.

I do not much like the Federation of Central Usea (FCU). They’ve done some bad things.

This week, Quinn, Chris, and Other Chris cover Ulysses from discovery to impact to the decades of fallout we still live with today. How humanity faced a possible extinction event, how we came together to defend ourselves, and how every Shield against Ulysses was turned into a Sword for war.

[This is an in-character episode covering the Ulysses Impact Event from the video game series Ace Combat. A big thank you to all the fans who contributed to the Journey Home singalong and Kilian Croghan for the episode art!]

SOURCES:

- Encyclopedia Strangereal

- Last Christmas, Gaze Magazine (Jan 1, 1999)

- Asteroid On Collision Course With Earth, Usea Today (Apr 21, 1996)

- Titan Guns, Our Science (Sept 20, 1998)

- The Twelve Colors of the Sky, Kei Nagase

- Lines in the Sand: A Memoir, L. Foulke

FTL theme song by DJ Danarchy

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Technofascism & Space

Wednesday, September 23, 2026 • Duration 01:13:36

What with all the history talk, we haven't really yet tackled the space elephant in the room: that the space industry is increasingly run by billionaires and open fascists. So today, we're chatting with Ziggy, a post-graduate student studying fascist movements and their ties to scifi, on how reactionary movements in the past and present have co-opted space for their political ends.

Find our merch store here

Support FTL on Patreon to unlock bonus content and join our Discord community

FTL theme song by DJ Danarchy

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*PREVIEW* The USSA Mars Shot Project (Fallout)

Wednesday, September 16, 2026 • Duration 15:50

This is a preview of a bonus episode. To hear the rest of the episode and unlock more bonus content, support Failure To Launch on Patreon at any tier.

In the months before the Bombs Fell, the American space program was preparing for its greatest challenge yet: reaching the Red Planet. But the program wasn't as innocent as it seemed. This week, Scribe Quintus is taking Chris and Other Chris through the history of the USSA's Mars Shot Project and the XMB Booster developed by ArcJet Systems.

A big thanks to Alex the OK, Nicholas Slayton, Angry Scooter, and Kelly of CIAS for contributing audiologs to this episode.

FTL theme song by DJ Danarchy

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Flight of the Alberts [5th Anniversary Special]

Sunday, September 13, 2026 • Duration 01:22:17

Capsule: check. Monkey: check. Downers: check.

To celebrate our 5th anniversary as a show, Quinn, Chris, and Other Chris are going back to the well to talk about our first ever topic: Project Albert. Or “that time the US Government launched a half dozen doped-up monkeys on captured Nazi V-2s”.

Find our merch store here

Support FTL on Patreon to unlock bonus content and join our Discord community

SOURCES:

- Animals in Space, Colin Burgess and Chris Dubbs

- Packing for Mars, Mary Roach

- A Brief History of Animals in Space, NASA

FTL theme song by DJ Danarchy

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Project 714 'Shuguang' (w. November Kelly)

Wednesday, September 9, 2026 • Duration 01:42:00

In the summer of 1966, work at China’s top-secret space program ground to a halt as every worker spent every day putting up posters, making denunciations, and murdering each other. This week, Quinn, Chris, and Other Chris are joined by November Kelly to talk about Project 714, China’s secret crewed space program and the incredibly dumb reason it died.

Check out November's work here (TF), and here (WTYP), and here (KJB), and here (BGDC), and here (NGNM)!

Find our merch store here

Support FTL on Patreon to unlock bonus content and join our Discord community

SOURCES:

- Thread of the Silkworm, Iris Chang

- China in Space, Brian Harvey

- China’s Space Program, S. Chandrashekar

FTL theme song by DJ Danarchy

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The Horrors of Early Space Food (w. Dr Kaveh Hoda)

Wednesday, August 26, 2026 • Duration 01:33:47

The first space food was made by veterinarians instead of dieticians and was so bad that many astronauts chose to fast through their missions. And it could've been *so* much worse. This week, Quinn, Chris, and Other Chris are talking to Dr Kaveh Hoda, gastroenterologist and host of the House of Pod podcast about the wonderful, disgusting world of astronaut kibble.

Check out Kaveh's work here!

Tragically, Backstroke of the West appears to have been taken down

Find our merch store here

Support FTL on Patreon to unlock bonus content and join our Discord community

SOURCES:

- Packing For Mars, Mary Roach

- Conference on Nutrition in Space and Related Waste Problems

FTL theme song by DJ Danarchy

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*PREVIEW* LDSS Nauvoo (The Expanse)

Wednesday, August 19, 2026 • Duration 19:44

This is a preview of a bonus episode. To hear the rest of the episode and unlock more bonus content, support Failure To Launch on Patreon at any tier.

Count the moons, duster! Today, Quinn (Belter), Chris (Martian), and Other Chris (Earther) are talking about the largest ship ever built by humans, the LDSS Nauvoo aka the OPAS Behemoth aka Medina Station. We cover its transformation from an ark for the faithful to a missile against the alien to a battleship for the Belt and to a crossroads between stars.

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Nuclear Rockets (w. Scooter)

Wednesday, August 12, 2026 • Duration 01:32:57

While most of NASA was focused on the Apollo Moon Program, a separate division was hard at work building then deliberately blowing up nuclear rocket cores all over Nevada. This week, we’re talking to train and nuclear knower Scooter about the weird and convoluted story of American nuclear rockets.

Support FTL on Patreon to unlock bonus content and join our Discord community!

SOURCES:

- Nuclear propulsion: A vital technology for the exploration of Mars and the planets beyond, NASA

- The NERVA Nuclear Rocket Reactor Program, W H Esselman

FTL theme song by DJ Danarchy

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Soyuz-23: Ice Fishing for Cosmonauts (w. Matt Lowne)

Wednesday, July 29, 2026 • Duration 01:08:06

A secret military space station, a rookie crew, a flaky autopilot, insufficient batteries, a freak winter storm, and a frozen lake. We’re joined by space and KSP youtuber Matt Lowne to talk about Soyuz-23, the only water touchdown of a Soviet spacecraft and how it very nearly killed its entire crew.

Check out Matt’s videos here!

Find our merch store here

Support FTL on Patreon to unlock bonus content and join our Discord community

SOURCES:

- Soyuz: A Universal Spacecraft, Rex Hall

- Salyut-5: The Last Military Lab, Anatoly Zak

- https://www.astronomy.com/space-exploration/soyuz-23-how-two-cosmonauts-almost-died-after-landing-back-on-earth/

FTL theme song by DJ Danarchy

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