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from the Which-will-first-orbit-the-Earth?-NASA-SLS-or-SpaceX-Starship? dept.
SLS debut slips to April 2021, KSC teams working through launch sims
Preparations continue at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida for the first launch of the Space Launch System, or SLS rocket – NASA's gigantic rocket the agency hopes to use to launch humans to the lunar surface and to the commercial-rocket constructed Lunar Gateway.
But while Kennedy prepares for the rocket's arrival and first mission, various NASA centers are now actively planning for a No Earlier Than 18 April 2021 launch for the rocket's debut.
[...] The 20 February 2020 NASA press release regarding the KSC launch team's performance of Artemis 1 countdown and launch simulations was the first NASA release to publicly confirm SLS will not fly this year, noting "NASA is preparing for the first uncrewed flight test next year of the agency's powerful new rocket and spacecraft in development for the Artemis lunar exploration program."
The previous NASA-provided No Earlier Than (NET) November 2020 launch date of Artemis 1 was always viewed as political in nature and not an accurate reflection of the rocket's readiness.
See also: Cruz skeptical about prospects for NASA appropriations or other legislation
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 29 2020, @01:57AM (7 children)
We could take your budget, give it to Elon, get to every damned planet in the Solar System by no later than (NLT) November 2020 and have enough money left over to give every American a free steak dinner.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 29 2020, @02:02AM (1 child)
What about the vegans?
(Score: 3, Funny) by NateMich on Saturday February 29 2020, @02:10AM
Yeah, fuck them too.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 29 2020, @02:05AM
Some prefer to suck on the governments giant tits instead of Elon's tiny dick.
(Score: 1) by Kitsune008 on Saturday February 29 2020, @03:09AM (3 children)
Not all of the blame falls at NASA's feet, as they have to take direction from our bought and paid for congress critters.
I understand your frustration, and share it...but focus your energy on the real target.
Pork, pork, and more pork is where it's at thanks to lobby money.
There is a cure, take money out of politics: www.wolf-pac.com.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 29 2020, @02:35PM (1 child)
Taking money out of politics is nonsensical. Politics in modern full-suffrage democracies are essentially driven by persuasion of a mostly uninformed electorate. It doesn't matter if you're persuading them by directly purchasing advertisements, or by indirectly spending money to convince "influencers" who can "organically" persuade them, or whatever other means ones might enlist. In the end it's all the exchange of some form of X for Y - where Y is, ultimately, votes. Getting rid of money would be little more than a change in semantics. The problem we have is much more basic, but also not really possible to solve in any politically correct fashion.
That problem is that we live in a democracy, but most of the people voting tend to be generally uninformed. And the personal characteristics that make one appealing to this demographic tend to fall rather outside the desirable characteristics for a political leader. In fact the characteristics that we, defacto, require politicians to have overlap 1:1 with conmen: fast-talk, charisma, persuasion, and an utter lack of morals. Trump vs Clinton. If we had an omniscient being that could somehow rank the general objective fitness of leadership of every person in this country, where do you think those two would have ranked?
The one thing that makes me optimistic here is Sanders. He is not especially charismatic nor even especially persuasive. He's simply a man who stuck to his values for decades living in a country where those values came gradually to be seen as more desired. I, now a days, disagree with him on just about everything - but I'd vote for him. An honest politician is about as common as a unicorn, and I think he's the closest we've come since perhaps JFK.
(Score: 2) by KilroySmith on Saturday February 29 2020, @04:46PM
>>> An honest politician is about as common as a unicorn, and I think he's the closest we've come since perhaps JFK.
I think you overlooked Carter. And when it comes to "utter lack of morals", certainly outshines JFK.
(Score: 2) by dry on Saturday February 29 2020, @03:31PM
While removing money from politics would help some issues, being able to point to jobs created is always going to be a good [re-]election strategy.
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Saturday February 29 2020, @02:46AM (2 children)
... and no later than 'sometime, maybe'.
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday February 29 2020, @02:55AM (1 child)
Better never than ever.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Saturday February 29 2020, @03:21AM
planned launch a few minutes before the kickbacks run out..
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Saturday February 29 2020, @03:29AM (1 child)
NASA (100% government) can't get it done in a timely and cost effective manner
Boeing (don't ask) can't get it done without killing an unknown number of astronauts in the process, assuming anyone is stupid enough to trust their software. Never mind that quote "I'm sitting on top of a tower of explosives made by the lowest bidder" crap, Boeing is no longer anywhere near the lowest bidder.
Space-X is doing just fine, the deck seems to be stacked against them but they're doing pretty good anyway.
Blue Origin and Virgin also seem to be moving right along.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday February 29 2020, @03:35AM
Virgin Galactic is having one hell of a week:
Virgin Galactic’s stock frenzy is starting to look a little like Tesla’s run [latimes.com]
Virgin Galactic Stock Is Skyrocketing. It’s Just Hype. [barrons.com]
Virgin Galactic sees demand for space travel surge [bbc.com]
Virgin Galactic stock craters after Credit Suisse downgrade [marketwatch.com]
Millennial traders who bought Virgin Galactic at top are now loading up on 'plague stocks' [cnbc.com]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by slap on Saturday February 29 2020, @04:19AM (3 children)
At this rate there is a good chance that SpaceX Starship will reach orbit before SLS launches.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Saturday February 29 2020, @05:09AM
Heck, it's not exactly a long shot that it might reach the Moon and maybe even Mars before SLS launches.
I mean - the early production models probably won't be suitable for long service lives. If some survive early testing until the next iterations render them obsolete, then attempting landings under very different gravity and atmosphere conditions would provide some wonderful data relatively early in the development process. Not to mention the crowing rights for landing a skyscraper on the moon before NASA even builds their "gateway".
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday February 29 2020, @12:24PM
https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-starship-launch-pad-transport-test-campaign/ [teslarati.com]
There could be a suborbital test in late March. I wouldn't expect orbital to happen before they get a Super Heavy on the pad, and that is dependent on these tests and Raptor engine production. Although a Starship with no booster or payload might be able to do single-stage-to-orbit, barely.
But yes, April 2021 (or later) is a lot of time for this fast-moving program and might even be enough time for a nice stunt like landing it on the Moon. In fact, SpaceX wanted to launch a commercial payload using Starship in 2021 [spacenews.com].
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @09:34AM
I'd be concerned about the meta. NASA is a big customer still, and while it shouldn't matter - humiliating them is probably not good for business.
(Score: 3, Touché) by bradley13 on Saturday February 29 2020, @10:11AM (1 child)
No matter how much you screw up, all your costs are paid, plus profit on top. The incentives are all wrong, because the more you screw up, the more money you make.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday February 29 2020, @06:08PM
Keep in mind the other side of these contracts - changing requirements. NASA is notorious (as are most US government organizations that rely on cost-plus) for changing its requirements on the fly without regard for cost or utility. For example, consider the question - what is the SLS going to be used for? There have been a host of sloppy, hand-waved ideas like Lunar Gateway, lunar settlement, Martian manned exploration, a few large space probes (due to spatial requirements or large propellant needs), etc. But no solid, well-funded mission exists to use that rocket. So what happens if Boeing should happen to deliver a working SLS rocket? Well, we get to spend more just to get that rocket to work with any mission concepts that survive that long. And I wouldn't be surprised if none of the present ideas make it. Even in 2021, it's going to be a different election cycle with possibly a different president.