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posted by Fnord666 on Wednesday May 20 2020, @05:20PM   Printer-friendly
from the headed-out-the-door dept.

NASA's human spaceflight chief just resigned, and the timing couldn't be worse:

On Tuesday, NASA announced that its chief of human spaceflight had resigned from the space agency. The timing of Doug Loverro's departure is terrible, with NASA's first launch of humans in nearly nine years due to occur in just eight days.

[...] "Associate Administrator for Human Exploration and Operations Doug Loverro has resigned from his position effective Monday, May 18," the statement said. "Loverro hit the ground running this year and has made significant progress in his time at NASA. His leadership of HEO has moved us closer to accomplishing our goal of landing the first woman and the next man on the Moon in 2024. Loverro has dedicated more than four decades of his life in service to our country, and we thank him for his service and contributions to the agency."

Loverro's resignation set off a firestorm of speculation after it was announced. He was due to chair a Flight Readiness Review meeting on Thursday to officially clear SpaceX's Crew Dragon spacecraft for the first flight of humans to the International Space Station. The final go or no-go decision for that mission was to be his. That launch is presently scheduled for May 27.

However, his departure does not seem to be directly related to his work on Crew Dragon. Rather it seems to stem from the recent process during which NASA selected three bids—led by Blue Origin, Dynetics, and SpaceX—from among five bidders. In an email to the human exploration staff at NASA on Tuesday, Loverro admitted that he made a mistake earlier this year.

"Our mission is certainly not easy, nor for the faint of heart, and risk-taking is part of the job description," Loverro wrote. "The risks we take, whether technical, political, or personal, all have potential consequences if we judge them incorrectly. I took such a risk earlier in the year because I judged it necessary to fulfill our mission. Now, over the balance of time, it is clear that I made a mistake in that choice for which I alone must bear the consequences. And therefore, it is with a very, very heavy heart that I write to you today to let you know that I have resigned from NASA effective May 18th, 2020."


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  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @06:12PM (19 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @06:12PM (#997018)

    You don't get the point. The goal is to put a human on the moon. That's not groundbreaking in any way. We did that OVER 50 YEARS AGO. Returned repeatedly and brought back a bunch of rocks. So now we're supposed to get excited about this again like it's some achievement? The woman angle is just like a reboot of a very old TV show but changing the male roles to be female roles. In the case of Hollywood and NASA, it's just a sign that they have no new ideas and are cowardly trying to cash in on something that was done ages ago that doesn't need revisiting. It's a dollar grab.

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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by khallow on Wednesday May 20 2020, @06:20PM (2 children)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday May 20 2020, @06:20PM (#997029) Journal

    So now we're supposed to get excited about this again like it's some achievement?

    Why not? Assuming they follow through, it's a step back towards doing interesting stuff in space.

    • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 21 2020, @02:39PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 21 2020, @02:39PM (#997390)

      Collecting rocks?

      • (Score: 2) by toddestan on Friday May 22 2020, @06:06PM

        by toddestan (4982) on Friday May 22 2020, @06:06PM (#997934)

        It's a step. Being it's our closest neighbor and we haven't been there for nearly 50 years, we it seems reasonable to go back to the moon first before we go Mars or a comet or something like that to collect rocks there.

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by PiMuNu on Wednesday May 20 2020, @06:46PM (2 children)

    by PiMuNu (3823) on Wednesday May 20 2020, @06:46PM (#997050)

    > You don't get the point

    To be fair, you made your point in a terrible way.

    > The goal is to put a human on the moon.

    * You said in GP "putting women on the moon is terrible" (I paraphrase; your language was somewhat more demeaning)
    * You claim now that you meant to say "putting people on the moon is terrible, and it doesn't matter what gender they are"

    So you phrased your point in a flamey way and then act surprised when you get a response to your flamery.

    • (Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @09:01PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @09:01PM (#997095)

      Please do not invent something I never said and put it in quotation marks indicating I said it.
      That was YOUR REACTION to what I said, not what I said.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @10:50PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @10:50PM (#997132)

        It's a dollar grab.

        Hmm, you want to exchange misogyny for stupidity? Ironically probably a smart move!

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @06:57PM (4 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @06:57PM (#997056)

    And?

    Given the historic oppression of women (remember, they only got to vote 100 years ago AFTER freed male slaves did) it is totally fine to celebrate women's accomplishments as something special. Should another country not celebrate launching a satellite just because Russia and the US did it before them?

    Pffft, lazy misogynist just doesn't want to be called out. Stop getting so upset about what other people do that affects your life in no way whatsoever.

    • (Score: 0, Flamebait) by Ethanol-fueled on Wednesday May 20 2020, @09:48PM (3 children)

      by Ethanol-fueled (2792) on Wednesday May 20 2020, @09:48PM (#997109) Homepage

      Why are all the female astronauts Jewish? Is being a hoary abrasive bitch part of that "right stuff" required to be an astronaut?

      • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @10:12PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @10:12PM (#997119)

        Because they know it'll piss you off to know a woman is waaaaaay out of your league. Both metaphorically and literally.

        How are those Tijuana whores treating you? Still have your last nut attached?

      • (Score: 3, Informative) by Kell on Wednesday May 20 2020, @11:19PM (1 child)

        by Kell (292) on Wednesday May 20 2020, @11:19PM (#997141)

        You seem to have exceptional information about people's religions that is not commonly available; please, out of demographic interest, tell me what religion each of the following is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_female_spacefarers [wikipedia.org]

        Or do you not know and you are just spouting bullshit?

        --
        Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @11:29PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @11:29PM (#997151)

          "Or do you not know and you are just spouting bullshit?"

          I hope that was a rhetorical question . . .

  • (Score: 5, Informative) by takyon on Wednesday May 20 2020, @07:18PM (4 children)

    by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Wednesday May 20 2020, @07:18PM (#997068) Journal

    The goal is to get back to the Moon and stay there this time.

    https://blogs.nasa.gov/bridenstine/2019/10/02/why-were-going-to-the-moon/ [nasa.gov]

    There are many reasons to go back, or as you may have heard me say, go forward to the Moon. With Artemis, we’re going to explore more of the Moon than ever before, and this time, we’re planning to stay. We are traveling 250,000 miles to the Moon to demonstrate new technologies, capabilities and business approaches needed for future exploration of Mars, which can be as far as 250 million miles away from home.

    --
    [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
    • (Score: 2) by Username on Wednesday May 20 2020, @10:36PM (3 children)

      by Username (4557) on Wednesday May 20 2020, @10:36PM (#997127)

      Hum. Why not just go to mars then? It's not like we can run to the moon and pick them up if it fails. Being closer doesn't make it safer. Going to make a large investment, might as well go for the big one first.

      • (Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday May 20 2020, @11:19PM

        by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Wednesday May 20 2020, @11:19PM (#997142) Journal

        There's politics and graft involved. But I actually prefer the Moon First approach.

        We have no business going to Mars without fully reusable rockets and in-orbit refueling ("The SLS rocket may have curbed development of on-orbit refueling for a decade" [arstechnica.com]). Obviously, that means SpaceX's Starship, although it's remotely possible some other company could provide it, maybe Blue Origin. The two technologies will allow NASA or others to get thousands of tons of cargo and possibly hundreds of humans on the surface of Mars for each $1 billion. Compare to untold billions to use SLS to get some station thing in Martian orbit and send a tiny lander down.

        Going to the Moon is relatively easy to do, so easy that Falcon 9 and Heavy are probably going to be used in place of SLS for a lot of the Artemis Program. There's already significant interest in the Moon from China, EU, India, and others. Travel time is short and there is hope for rescue if something goes wrong.

        In my opinion, Artemis will continue even if we have a President Biden next year. The program can be scaled up or down as needed, since there's a combo of rovers/bots, manned landings, and an unnecessary space station. Let NASA (Congress) blow money on Artemis, while the technologies needed to explore Mars for real are developed.

        --
        [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @11:23PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @11:23PM (#997143)

        Because committing to going to Mars would be a real challenge, a true leap forward in manned spaced exploration.
        A trip back to the moon is "safe": been there, done that, over 50 years ago, with far more primitive technology.

        To be fair though, I don't think we are ready just yet to take on Mars. I believe we need more applied research before we can fire up that rocket aimed at the Red Planet.
        To be less fair, I think the NASA manned spaceflight organization needs a big ticket mission to justify its existence.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 21 2020, @07:41PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 21 2020, @07:41PM (#997532)

        The moon is good practice. We know that we can get there and back without much trouble, but a base has never been done before. Going to Mars directly means overcoming the (much greater) travel difficulties and the base at the same time. And yes, escape from the moon is much simpler. If a moon base has problems then you can evacuate in your return ship immediately and you will be home in a few days. You don't have to wait up to a year for a planetary alignment before you can start your months long trip home.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @08:31PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @08:31PM (#997089)

    Getting your priorities in order is not for us mere 'incels'. It is only for the holier than thou woke. As they 'know' as they are woke.... If only the world would understand them!

    BTW my wife thinks the whole thing is a load of rubbish and makes women look bad for promoting that over doing real things.

    • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @10:14PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @10:14PM (#997120)

      Tell your wife to make me a sandwich. I'll PM you the address. I like pastrami on rye, think she can manage that?

  • (Score: 2, Funny) by Sulla on Thursday May 21 2020, @03:35AM

    by Sulla (5173) on Thursday May 21 2020, @03:35AM (#997243) Journal

    Yeah but we have never done it before using the metric system, in fact nobody has done that. This feat will be unmatched in human history.

    --
    Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam