NASA: Lost its grip on reality or accepted it?

[ltgbrown]

NASA has sole sourced landing astronauts on the moon with SpaceX and its still in early (and explosive) development Starship.

https://www.technologyreview.com/2021/0 ... r-artemis/

or

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technolo ... ct-spacex/

This seems like a completely out of character choice by NASA. I am skeptically optimistic that NASA has made a prescient choice and that we will see astronauts on the moon in just a few short years!

[mvanwink5]

NASA looks to have made a decision based on SpaceX demonstrated ability to launch real rockets at a far lower cost than their competitors. Further Starship has flown, it is landing that they are still working on. The booster for the Starship is using the same engine and construction methods. Finally, SpaceX has shown that they can make a human rated craft, and with Gertsner on board their team why cast more doubt than their untested and far more expensive competitive bids?

[Grumalg]

https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/04 ... ar-lander/
.....
About a year ago, NASA gave initial study and preliminary development contracts for Moon landers to SpaceX, Dynetics, and a team of aerospace heavyweights led by Blue Origin. The cost of SpaceX's bid was about half that of Dynetics, and one-fourth the amount received by Blue Origin. That frugality, at least in part, led NASA on Friday to choose SpaceX as the sole provider of landing services during the down-select phase.
.....
Ultimately, the selection criteria were based on a company's technical proficiency, management, and cost. SpaceX scored well in all three. But budget appears to have been the biggest factor. The space agency has had difficulty securing funding from Congress for the lunar lander aspect of the program. For the current fiscal year, NASA said it needed $3.3 billion in funding to meet the goal of landing humans on the Moon by 2024. Congress provided just $850 million, and as a result, NASA acknowledged that 2024 was no longer a realistic target.
.....

As is so often the case in space spending, it appears the choice was financially forced...

[mvanwink5]

Yes, budget constraints forced NASA into the briar patch. The joke is that SpaceX would have just gone straight to Mars if they did not get money for the Moon. And if money was the deciding factor, SpaceX would be the human transport to Lunar orbit rather than Orion.

[Carl White]

Some elements of Congress are not pleased with this. Who knows, they might increase NASA's funding and demand that the "National Team" be taken on as well.

[natebrau]

Good point- this might be politically-aligned thinking on NASA's part- by deliberately angering part of Congress, they might shake loose the budget to get their desired 2 solutions for dissimilar redundancy. By emphasizing that they chose strictly on cost, Congress can respond by offering up more money instead of an unfunded mandate.