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NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission

(www.cnn.com)
404 points voxleone | 9 comments | 21 Oct 25 12:58 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source | bottom
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allenrb ◴[21 Oct 25 20:38 UTC] No.45661384[source]▶
There is just so much wrong with this from start to finish. Here are a few things, by no means inclusive:

1. We’ve already beaten China to the moon by 56 years, 3 months, and some change. And counting.

2. Nothing based around SLS is remotely serious. The cost and timeline of doing anything with it are unreasonable. It is an absolute dead-end. The SpaceX Super Heavy has been more capable arguably as early as the second flight test and certainly now. They could have built a “dumb” second stage at any time, but aren’t that short-sighted.

3. Blue Origin? I’ve had high hopes for the guys for two decades now. Don’t hold your breath.

4. Anyone else? Really, really don’t hold your breath.

This whole “race to the moon, part II” is almost criminally stupid. Land on the moon when we can accomplish something there, not just to prove we haven’t lost our mojo since Apollo.

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Waterluvian ◴[21 Oct 25 21:41 UTC] No.45662078[source]▶
Re: 1. I think the America of Theseus mindset is a bit troubling. A lot of people like to identify with achievements that they played no role in. Based on zero expertise whatsoever, I have a sense that this is a bit self defeating. To be born a winner, to be taught you’re a winner… how can that be healthy?

Today’s America scores zero points for its accomplishments of the past. But I think one way it can be a good thing is the, “we’ve done it before, we can do it again” attitude. Which is somewhat opposite to “we already won!”

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zdragnar ◴[21 Oct 25 22:36 UTC] No.45662614[source]▶
America cannot possibly win the space race again, because it has already been won. The first to get there has already happened.

The idea that we need to land on the moon once a generation just to say that we are as good at landing on the moon as our parents is absurd.

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bdangubic ◴[22 Oct 25 00:44 UTC] No.45663668[source]▶
> The first to get there has already happened.

Motorola was the first to create a handheld mobile phone, Apple just did not get that memo... :)

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1. skeeter2020 ◴[22 Oct 25 01:45 UTC] No.45664048{3}[source]▶
But Apple didn't recreate the same mobile handset as Motorola or anybody else. There is very little value or scientific benefit in going back to the moon within the parameters of this mission; it's literally "do the same thing again".
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2. mrheosuper ◴[22 Oct 25 02:32 UTC] No.45664298[source]▶
What do you mean "the same thing"? Different rocket, different suits, and different budget.

If we want to put people on Mars, we must prove we can put people on Moon, again.

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3. lkjdsklf ◴[22 Oct 25 05:01 UTC] No.45665047[source]▶
Its also in an entirely different part of the moon, from an entirely different orbit

It’s like saying visiting the marianas trench and Everest are the same because they’re both on earth

4. bruce511 ◴[22 Oct 25 05:48 UTC] No.45665300[source]▶
Putting people on Mars US equally useless. Any colony on Mars would require enormous support from Earth. It would never be self-suffient.

Mars would need water, air, energy, raw materials, fuel and everything else for (basically) ever.

There is zero to be gained (here) from a Mars colony. Mars lacks a magnetic field, air to breath, water to drink or cultivate crops, a temperature suitable for plant or animal life, fuel sources to build industry, supply chains for the construction or maintainence of the simplest electrical systems.

Talk of Mars is purely a PR play. Someone will be first. Yay. But Mars will play no part in Earth's future.

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5. anigbrowl ◴[22 Oct 25 05:58 UTC] No.45665347[source]▶
Incredible lack of imagination. If we went back to the moon on the regular we could by now have high resolution cameras permanently installed there pointing back at Earth, sending video in real time.

but we have satellites for that

High resolution photographs of the entire earth (as opposed to tiny pieces of it) would have a massive positive emotional effect on people. The Earthrise photo's enduring popularity is proof of this. There's water on the Moon; we could have bases there by now, even if they were limited in functionality and size, like the ISS. We could have remote-control or autonomous moon rovers and bipedal robots exploring there 24-7.

Instead we have Moon landing denialists one one hand and jaded 'it's just a rock, who cares' nay-sayers on the other.

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6. m4rtink ◴[22 Oct 25 11:30 UTC] No.45667500[source]▶
There a satellite that does that: https://epic.gsfc.nasa.gov/

Well, when US is not running out of money.

7. m4rtink ◴[22 Oct 25 11:32 UTC] No.45667529[source]▶
Mars has actually quite different environment to the Moon if you wan't to do surface testing: no atmosphere, different gravity, abrasive dust, different day and year length, different solar constant, etc.

For spaxe infrastructure however - sure, stuff mined and manufactured on the Moon can definitely help any planetary missions.

8. xvilka ◴[22 Oct 25 11:58 UTC] No.45667740{3}[source]▶
I think we should aim for Ceres[1] instead, which is way more resources rich compared to Mars for a sustainable colony. And a perfect starting point for exploring the rest of the asteroid belt[2].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geology_of_Ceres

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonization_of_the_asteroid_b...

9. vel0city ◴[22 Oct 25 12:46 UTC] No.45668255[source]▶
> High resolution photographs of the entire earth

We already have this, it doesn't require being on the moon.

> There's water on the Moon; we could have bases there by now, even if they were limited in functionality and size, like the ISS.

The scale of going to the ISS versus the moon is massively different. Most of the research we'd be doing on the moon that isn't just for robots to do like digging in the dirt could still be done on an orbiting space station (like, how to mitigate effects of microgravity on the human body, how to cultivate plants in low gravity, studying microorganisms and chemistry in space, etc.)

> We could have remote-control or autonomous moon rovers and bipedal robots exploring there 24-7.

This doesn't require a human presence on the moon. We've had nearly uninterrupted robots on Mars for decades and haven't had a human on it.

> Instead we have Moon landing denialists one one hand

You had moon landing denialists even right after we landed. Us continuing to be on the moon isn't going to get rid of these naysayers. People are arguing the earth is flat, that anthropogenic climate change can't be possible, that the earth is 40,000 years old, and vaccines are mind control agents.

I get it would be cool and there probably is some science that could only be done with humans on the moon that I don't know about (I don't know everything, for sure). I think it would do a lot to push our engineering forward to have this kind of constant investment towards operating in space. But outside of being a means to funnel public funds to engineering firms to essentially find cooler ways to burn money I'm not sure it's all worth it.

Not saying we shouldn't have a space program! There's still lots we don't know about the universe and lots of cool science to learn. But do we need actual humans on the moon to achieve these goals?