Space Exploration

Are NASA's future missions and budget justified?

  • It's worth the time and expenditures

    Votes: 221 66.0%

  • Complete waste of money

    Votes: 41 12.2%

  • We need to explore, but not at the current cost

    Votes: 73 21.8%
  • Total voters
    335
#5,277
#5,277
Grand Vol said:
So I've seen different sides of this on several sites. Some think it's a worthy goal, others think it's a waste of money that could be better spent on more earthly projects.

How does VN feel about the budgets for NASA as well as the goals in our space programs?

ETA: NASA budget typically runs $17-18 Billion and change.

Budget of NASA - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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If you cut all the climate change, global warming garbage that they have been wasting money on and start spending it on getting us off this rock, then most would not be concerned with they costs because their costs would be more reasonable.
 
#5,279
#5,279
Volnanza said:
If you cut all the climate change, global warming garbage that they have been wasting money on and start spending it on getting us off this rock, then most would not be concerned with they costs because their costs would be more reasonable.
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Give about half of that budget directly to SpaceX and watch what happens 😀
 
#5,281
#5,281
chatsworth_vol said:
I know it ain't gonna happen for a variety of reasons, but I'm sure the idea had crossed everyone's mind. Wouldn't it be funny as hell if SpaceX has to send a capsule up and "rescue " the astronauts from the Starliner?
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I was talking with a friend about this. Those astronauts have been in space 49/50 days. on a 8 day mission. I know the ISS is stocked, but that has to be draining resources.

If I am musk, I am offering a free ride back to those two stuck up there. heck even flying a completely free mission to bring them back may be worth it, just for the PR and to put the nail in Boeing.

another issue is that the Boeing capsule is taking up one of the docking tubes.
 
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#5,288
#5,288
twoffo said:
Kind of amazing to watch SpaceX keep improving the Raptor engine. Somebody seems serious about going to Mars.
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They would have kept tinkering with the Merlin engines as well, but when the F9 got manned certified, they aren't allowed to continue doing changes like they did. Basically, they have to run all major design changes through NASA now on the Merlin, so, they aren't really messing with it any longer and focusing on the Raptor.

When the Starship gets its manned rating, they won't be allowed to do much more with the Raptor either.
 
#5,289
#5,289
Grand Vol said:
They would have kept tinkering with the Merlin engines as well, but when the F9 got manned certified, they aren't allowed to continue doing changes like they did. Basically, they have to run all major design changes through NASA now on the Merlin, so, they aren't really messing with it any longer and focusing on the Raptor.

When the Starship gets its manned rating, they won't be allowed to do much more with the Raptor either.
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And the current Falcon 9 Block 5 with the current Merlin design is so stable and well understood that there is no reason to tinker with it. It is a mature technology with several hundred successful flights under its belt
 
#5,290
#5,290
Boeing Starliner now taking up a docking port on the ISS and cannot even be undocked remotely due to incomplete software 😳.
So Starliner has become the space equivalent of that junker car that your cousin parked „temporarily“ in your driveway but is now up on cinder blocks and dripping oil on your concrete while preventing YOU from parking.

Well played Boeing, well played 🙄
 
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#5,291
#5,291
OrangeTsar said:
And the current Falcon 9 Block 5 with the current Merlin design is so stable and well understood that there is no reason to tinker with it. It is a mature technology with several hundred successful flights under its belt
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It may be, but I'm betting a company like SpaceX wouldn't mind a little more increased efficiency out of the Merlin. They did go leaps and bounds from the 1A to the 1D models. Even another 10K thrust would be hugely beneficial for the F9 design.

With the Vulcan still working out the bugs and the remaining Atlas rockets all claimed, they are really the only game in town. Improving the veteran design would help especially with European companies starting to wonder if the Ariane 6 is really worth the cost and American companies starting to look at other (quicker) options than Vulcan. I saw a video not long ago that even Sierra Space is quietly looking at the F9 or Heavy for the Dreamchaser since the Vulcan launches are being claimed by government agencies. Though I think there are engineering problems there they would have to work out.

Either way, it is reliable, but a little improvement never hurt anything.
 
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#5,292
#5,292
OrangeTsar said:
Boeing Starliner now taking up a docking port on the ISS and cannot even be undocked remotely due to incomplete software 😳.
So Starliner has become the space equivalent of that junker car that your cousin parked „temporarily“ in your driveway but is now up on cinder blocks and dripping oil on your concrete while preventing YOU from parking.

Well played Boeing, well played 🙄
Click to expand...

Anyone else thinking NASA quietly has a team trying to figure out if or how the Boeing pressure suits would integrate with the Crew Dragon and having the Crew 9 command team prep for a two person mission?

You know there's a white paper floating around somewhere in Houston with those details...

Plus, they do have an extra Crew Dragon at the Cape for the Axios mission. While Axios already paid for it, NASA could step in and say "look, we need it for an orbital Uber pickup of stranded astronauts..." and bump them back a few months while SpaceX preps another Dragon.

I get they can't undock Starliner without a pilot at the controls, but how hard would it be to EVA from the ship after undocking and deorbit it autonomously? And bring back those two on the Dragon? They should have the right sized EVA suits on the ISS for that kind of job.
 
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#5,293
#5,293
And an addendum to the above...

Musk would be well within his rights to charge a "rideshare" fee to Boeing much like Grumman did to North American after Apollo 13 if they did use Dragon to bring back the Starliner crew.

It's certainly within his level of troll to do so.
 
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#5,294
#5,294
Grand Vol said:
Anyone else thinking NASA quietly has a team trying to figure out if or how the Boeing pressure suits would integrate with the Crew Dragon and having the Crew 9 command team prep for a two person mission?

You know there's a white paper floating around somewhere in Houston with those details...

Plus, they do have an extra Crew Dragon at the Cape for the Axios mission. While Axios already paid for it, NASA could step in and say "look, we need it for an orbital Uber pickup of stranded astronauts..." and bump them back a few months while SpaceX preps another Dragon.

I get they can't undock Starliner without a pilot at the controls, but how hard would it be to EVA from the ship after undocking and deorbit it autonomously? And bring back those two on the Dragon? They should have the right sized EVA suits on the ISS for that kind of job.
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yeah I was wondering if the arm they used to grab the supply shuttle was close enough to the Starliner dock to grab it. figured they could have someone in there, go through the undocking process, and then EVA from the capsule held by the arm. no risk of floating off. only issue would be, do they trust being able to get back out?

Seems like a pretty high risk if they are already having software issues. I can't imagine there are too many pieces of software that handle the docking process, which would seemingly also be the way to get out once undocked.
 
#5,295
#5,295
Grand Vol said:
And an addendum to the above...

Musk would be well within his rights to charge a "rideshare" fee to Boeing much like Grumman did to North American after Apollo 13 if they did use Dragon to bring back the Starliner crew.

It's certainly within his level of troll to do so.
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I would call it a rescue mission and offer not to charge for the seats. absolutely kill Boeing in PR to the point that even NASA/Congress have to admit Boeing isn't viable for manned flights. be that "good faith" partner, even if its just a spring board to secure a relative monopoly.
 
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#5,297
#5,297
Grand Vol said:
Anyone else thinking NASA quietly has a team trying to figure out if or how the Boeing pressure suits would integrate with the Crew Dragon and having the Crew 9 command team prep for a two person mission?

You know there's a white paper floating around somewhere in Houston with those details...

Plus, they do have an extra Crew Dragon at the Cape for the Axios mission. While Axios already paid for it, NASA could step in and say "look, we need it for an orbital Uber pickup of stranded astronauts..." and bump them back a few months while SpaceX preps another Dragon.

I get they can't undock Starliner without a pilot at the controls, but how hard would it be to EVA from the ship after undocking and deorbit it autonomously? And bring back those two on the Dragon? They should have the right sized EVA suits on the ISS for that kind of job.
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There is a lot to unpack there. I am definitely not an expert on this situation but from what I have been able to gather in the last 72 hours: here are some of the complications as I understand them.
With regards to the suits and connections; apparently SpaceX being the efficient designers they are, hook their suits to the spacecraft with a single integrated cable with a single connector whilst Boeing Spacesuits have multiple separate cables each with its own unique plug. To make the two work together would require a fairly complex adapter that would have to be designed, built, and tested. It should be much quicker to simply make SpaceX suits to the measurements of the Dtarliner crew.
With regards to the undocking problem: I believe the actual act of undocking the capsule is only a small part of the problem. The process of gently backing away from the docking port without accidentally colliding with the station requires absolute stability and consists of multiple very precise maneuvers until the capsule exits the keep away zone surrounding the station. At that point, I think it is 200 meters from the station, making a spacewalk back pretty much impossible. And that would also assume that the astronaut doing the spacewalk back would have to be wearing an ISS EVA suit as the Boeing suits are simply pressure suits not designed for spacewalks. And I think the ISS EVA suits are too large to exit through the Starliner hatch.
So basically there are no easy solutions. Boeing has painted NASA into a corner here without any good way out.
 
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#5,298
#5,298
Grand Vol said:
And an addendum to the above...

Musk would be well within his rights to charge a "rideshare" fee to Boeing much like Grumman did to North American after Apollo 13 if they did use Dragon to bring back the Starliner crew.

It's certainly within his level of troll to do so.
Click to expand...

Can you expand on this? That has to be a great story.
 
#5,299
#5,299
LouderVol said:
I would call it a rescue mission and offer not to charge for the seats. absolutely kill Boeing in PR to the point that even NASA/Congress have to admit Boeing isn't viable for manned flights. be that "good faith" partner, even if its just a spring board to secure a relative monopoly.
Click to expand...

I'm pretty sure NASA and Congress are getting to that point already. I think the Starliner problems were bright up during the 737 MAX hearing by one of the Senators.

But they absolutely would destroy Boeing in the PR department by calling it a rescue. Because even if NASA or SpaceX don't, the media likely would call it that.
 
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#5,300
#5,300
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