SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
from the to-boldly-go-where-only-a-few-men-have-gone-before dept.
Third European Service Module for Artemis Mission to Land Astronauts on the Moon:
It's official: when astronauts land on the Moon in 2024 they will get there with help from the European Service Module. The European Space Agency signed a contract with Airbus to build the third European Service Module for NASA's Orion spacecraft that will ferry the next astronauts to land on the Moon.
NASA's Artemis program is returning humans to the Moon with ESA's European Service Module supplying everything needed to keep the astronauts alive on their trip in the crew module – water, air, propulsion, electricity, a comfortable temperature as well as acting as the chassis of the spacecraft.
The third Artemis mission will fly astronauts to Earth's natural satellite in 2024 – the first to land on the Moon since Apollo 17 following a hiatus of more than 50 years.
ESA's director of Human and Robotic Exploration David Parker said: "By entering into this agreement, we are again demonstrating that Europe is a strong and reliable partner in Artemis. The European Service Module represents a crucial contribution to this, allowing scientific research, development of key technologies, and international cooperation – inspiring missions that expand humankind's presence beyond Low Earth Orbit."
[...] The first European Service Module is being handed over to NASA at their Kennedy Space Center for an uncrewed launch next year, and the second is in production at the Airbus integration hall in Bremen, Germany.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 03 2020, @02:35PM
sheesh someone teach them boeings and easa some basic financial knowledge:
for two non-selfsustaining outerspace projects the one that uses reusable rockets wins, everytime (unless ofc, for example making a 10 time reusable rocket ten times more expensive).
boeing and esa should totally ignore anything "outerspace" and redo their first step: that is getting off the planet with the same hardware, multiple times.
it's like some else said: sinking your ocean linear after one ocean crossing.
boeing and esa (ariane) talking about "spaceships" is like talking about the designing a new pier at arrival site for the ship that sinks on arrival.
ofc, all this "throw away, one way rocketry" is a grandfathered philosophy from the atom bomb times: rockets were primarly (just like "civilian" reactors) ment to deliver bombs!
you're not going to put much research into resuable rockets that deliver atom bomb. you just hope the thing flies and doesn't fall back on your head!
so one could say that each and every on-way, one-use, exo-athmosphere rocket TODAY is acctually a atom bomb delivery mechanism in disguise, dressed up with "civilian" payloads, that at a whim could turn into a bomb carrier.
the "sputnik" shock was really about parking a potential bomb in orbit and everybody was hopeing the "ewwp", "ewwwp" interval it was emitting was getting shorter and shorter, signalling it is homeing in to a target.
the first person to orbit was another shock: it meant that jamming a orbital parked nuked would not work, since now a unjammable trigger finger attached to a astronaut could be sent up to ... push the button if need be.
so, dear boeing and esa stop disguising your silly one way atom bomb delivery mechanisms as outerspace exploration enabling devices ...