First he called cost-plus contracts a “plague” on the agency, and now he’s praising SpaceX (while pretending that he wasn’t one of the “poo pooers” himself, who told Lori to “get her boy Elon in line”). And I love this:
“
When there was the beginning of the space cargo and crew [programs], the two serious bidders were SpaceX and Boeing, and everybody poo-pooed SpaceX and said, ‘Oh, Boeing is a legacy company,'” Nelson said. “Well, guess who is about to make its sixth flight after its first test flight with astronauts, and guess who’s still on the ground?”
Today is the sixtieth anniversary. I wrote this on the fortieth anniversary, and it holds up pretty well, I think. “Because it is hard” is a dumb reason to do something.
Hearing that they had an in-flight abort on a research flight (no one on board). Capsule reportedly landed safely.
[Update a few minutes later]
Here are frame grabs of the Blue Origin New Shepard NS-23 “anomaly”. Rocket plume goes bright in 1 frame, spreads to left bottom of booster, capsule abort motor fires.https://t.co/wnp2fVK5xkpic.twitter.com/0Z9sZdIomQ
It may be unfair to compare SpaceX and NASA, but SpaceX is built to be fast-but-risky whereas NASA is built to be slow-but-reliable. We’re now seeing that the fast-but-risky approach is actually leading to not only faster but more reliable results. Artemis is this giant U.S. government program that leaks money—as the Apollo program was—and that seems antiquated, but lots of members of Congress could get behind its traditional approach, which made use of languishing NASA facilities and had a supply chain stretching into lots of different communities. There are real benefits to NASA doing work across these communities, of course, but this approach can get in the way of doing things quickly, being able to change direction when engineers learn something new, or being free to adopt new technology and machinery. There’s less flexibility. And the Space Launch System isn’t reusable, either, meaning it’s a costly rocket that can only be used once. It would be foolish to stop this program now, but it would be grossly irresponsible to replicate it in the future.
He doesn’t explain why it would be “foolish to stop this program now.” I can only think that it’s the sunk-cost fallacy, but I think that what is foolish is to continue to throw good money after bad.
🧵: I discovered this woman, who I call Loab, in April. The AI reproduced her more easily than most celebrities. Her presence is persistent, and she haunts every image she touches. CW: Take a seat. This is a true horror story, and veers sharply macabre. pic.twitter.com/gmUlf6mZtk
There is a cultural battle within America's space industry, but no, it's not Moon versus Mars. It's redoing Apollo versus space settlement and development, with thousands of people working, living, and playing in space.https://t.co/AEEVp3WVih
Whoever had the brilliant idea of building a rocket out of 1970s technology apparently was unaware, or had amnesia about all the problems caused by hydrogen with the Shuttle.
“I would simply say to you that space is hard,” he said at an August 27 briefing when asked what lessons NASA could take from the extended delays in SLS’s development. “We are developing new systems and new technologies, and it takes money and it takes time.”
Yes, space is hard. It’s even harder when you make terrible design choices in order to provide a jobs program for existing workers and contractors. There is little new about either these systems or technologies.