The alternative is the SLS, how many billions down the drain is that?
The true issue with the launch was the flight termination system taking 15-30s to trigger, which they have had to requalify since that is what protects the public from harm.
The true issue with the launch was the flight termination system taking 15-30s to trigger, which they have had to requalify since that is what protects the public from harm.
Nasa over engineered pad 39A and now they have a pad that can probably launch anything. But SpaceX with stage 0 did absolutely nothing even though most rockets in history used a diverter of some kind. A simpler and cheaper solution is welcome, but ignoring physics and doing nothing is just baffling (especially for the largest rocket ever). Even RocketLab with their tiny Electron have a diverter. You can see it here: https://youtu.be/P_tGKxL6CLI?t=31
- it destroyed its pad
- it went off course as soon as it left the pad
- 8 out of 33 engines failed - one of which immediately after firing (causing it to go off course)
We'll see what the future brings, but for now its clearly SLS 1 - Starhsip 0. Given the amount of failures in the Starship exepriment, my bet is that we'll see at least 1 more successful SLS launch before the first Starship launch to reach orbit and back.
SLS could have been done differently. Instead it was loaded with political favors demanding specific parts/suppliers.
Bloat = waste, that is just circular logic. You're defining what you want to call waste as a synonym of waste. Nasa gets a budget and spend it on space missions, propulsion technology and launch vehicles. That money employs engineers and scientists and generates demand for high specs engineering firms and supply chains. The bang for the buck is this impact on the economy, stimulating education, R&D etc. Not the rocket that fits your definition of efficiency. Having more then one actively used propulsion vehicle with different technological approaches is a national investment in resilience.
Calling it bloat and inefficient because it takes more money per launch then another 100% experimental and unproven platform is incredibly myopic.
If you want sources for government spending too much on things, those exist all over.
> Calling it bloat and inefficient because it takes more money per launch then another 100% experimental and unproven platform is incredibly myopic.
No, that's not what people are saying. The problem is that the main companies NASA contracts to are running in an extremely inefficient way and they get paid more when they waste money.
This is a problem that would exist even if SpaceX never became a company.
> That money employs engineers and scientists and generates demand for high specs engineering firms and supply chains. The bang for the buck is this impact on the economy, stimulating education, R&D etc.
The problem is the dollars that aren't going to engineering and R&D.
Dollars that just stimulate the economy are bloat when they're going to some big company out of a budget that's supposed to be doing things like exploring space. If you want to just send out dollars to stimulate the economy, send them out to people with low incomes and they'll have a much bigger impact.
Thank you for ignoring 95% of my post with that useless rejection.