Technology

To be fair, some work has always been outsourced.

Like the o rings…

NASA contracting stuff to space X has probably be the most amazing and sound financial decision they have made.

People on this website are so biased because Elon runs it but he genuinely built one of the most amazing companies in the world. Government including the US are miles behind them and struggling to play catch up and they are only trying because Space X has become so much better than them they have to.

I’ve worked for several aerospace companies including Boeing. I have nothing but contempt and hatred for Boeing and couldn’t get out of there fast enough. Management is garbage, safety comes second to schedule, people are treated like disposable cogs, but I would trust Boeing over NASA. I work with a lot of NASA and ex-NASA people right now on a couple major projects. Dear god NASA upper management makes me want to put my head through a wall! The insufferable sense of superiority trying to tell us “how things are done”. Bro, how is SLS coming? That’s what I thought, shut your mouth and stop pretending like you are the Apple of space systems. Luckily, most of the ground level people at NASA are more down to earth (pardon the puns) and easier to work with.

Step 4. NASA builds planes that work (on the side).

They tried being more actively involved with the Aries I and Aries V rockets, but they got really bogged down to the point where Obama started commercial crew. Aries V eventually evolved into SLS, but with low capability and a very long schedule. And for better or for worse, SLS is getting lots of funding.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ares_I https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commercial_Crew_Program

I’m sure they understand the problems, and they understand that solving them would eat into their profits

Another test flight will be a bit of a problem. There are no spare Atlas V rockets. They will either have to convince Amazon to give up one of theirs or they will have to launch one of the missions on Vulcan Centaur, which is not currently crew rated.

This is exactly it for me. A problem is one thing, a problem can be addressed. But a problem whose core cause is not understood can't be quantified or addressed.

So you have a thruster pack that's overheating and they don't even know why, you have helium that's leaking and they don't even know why, so I ask why is it even a question what to do?

I am among other things a private pilot, I fly little propeller airplanes around for fun. Lots of private pilots do stupid stuff, and some get killed as a result. I'm talking for example pilots who want to get back to their home airport, so they fly over five airports that all sell fuel without landing but then run out of gas and crash half a mile from their home airport. So there is a saying, before you do anything risky, consider how stupid you will look in the NTSB report if it doesn't work out. And the pilot who intentionally flew below fuel minimums looks pretty damn stupid, destroyed a $100,000 airplane and lost his life so he could save 20 bucks on cheaper gas.

Point is, the same principle applies to all of the recent space disasters. Challenger was obviously not the right decision to launch. Columbia obviously a serious risk that was ignored. And that brings us to Starliner, we have serious fundamental problems that could definitely lead to a loss of ship and crew situation and we don't even understand what is causing those problems. Now imagine Starliner fails. How stupid will that decision look? Probably even dumber than Columbia or Challenger, because unlike those two disasters we know ahead of time that something is very wrong.

Can’t wait to see this project too in Google’s graveyard.

They eat whichever astronaut dies first.

Just don't question the cause of death, because it will be blunt force trauma

Don't they have their own version of MREs they use for situations like this?

they must have a significant food bank supply, including some kind of reserve replacement nutrients in the event shit goes wrong. That or an incredibly redundant delivery network.

Cygnus, last mission launched on 4 August 2024.

How many people died because boeing made shitty planes and didn’t train their crew properly?

Is boeing done for?

They already couldn't afford this situation, and look where they are.

What's an improbable "acceptable risk" to them may not be good enough for NASA, especially if they don't really understand what's wrong.

The question facing NASA’s leadership today? Should the two astronauts return to Earth...

"Alright, just hear me out..." -Boeing

The lives of two government employees are in the balance, and taxpayers paid Boeing for most of the Starliner spacecraft's development costs.

Money money money...

Unfortunately they’ve been moving backwards across the time zones, resulting in them owing NASA money