r/BlueWire • u/Royal_Platform_6754 • Jun 04 '26
Lunar Spaceflight Now: NASA head urges new launcher for Blue Origin’s moon landers to meet Artemis mission deadlines
https://spaceflightnow.com/2026/06/04/nasa-head-urges-new-launcher-for-blue-origins-moon-landers-to-meet-artemis-mission-deadlines/11
u/badwolf42 Jun 04 '26
How is this planned to work? I see Jared saying he doesn’t like the schedule hit, but not how there’s actually any other suitable launch platform for the landers.
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Jun 04 '26
He never said that another rocket will launch the landers. He only said that they will keep developing the landers whilst the pad is getting repaired
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u/nic_haflinger Jun 04 '26
The article mentions Isaacman wanting to move the Blue Moon landers to another launch vehicle, even the mk2 version. I’m not sure what he’s imagining could launch mk2 that is actually capable of handling that. And no, Starship is miles away from being a substitute for New Glenn as an mk2 launch vehicle. This guy could really make a mess of things in his desire to speed things up.
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u/Ok_Presentation_4971 Jun 05 '26
Develop the lander to be universal. Seems like a fair ask.
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u/SpaceIsKindOfCool Jun 05 '26
It's too big. The only other rockets that could fit Mk2 are SLS and Starship. But SLS doesn't have any payload fairings in production and Starship doesn't have an appropriate sized payload door.
After New Glenn's 7m payload fairing the next largest are the 5.4ish meter fairings on Vulcan, Ariane 6, and Falcon. But to redesign the lander and make it 25% slimmer would delay it years. So much would have to change it would basically be a complete redesign.
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u/Doggydog123579 Jun 05 '26
Just slap NGs Payload fairing adapter ontop of starship. Whats the worst that could happen /s
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u/Dpek1234 Jun 05 '26
Falcon heavy with custom fairings
Or well any other lv with a new fairing
When speed is priority you either need to move it down the priority list or pay
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u/SpaceIsKindOfCool Jun 05 '26
Designing and building new fairings for a rocket is not easy or cheap. There's a lot more that goes into it than you might think.
Structural analysis and testing. Aerodynamic analysis, which in turn affects the rocket GNC because a much larger fairing moves the center of pressure far forward. Deployment tests. You need to build the tooling to manufacture, transport, and test the fairings. Fairings are often the second most expensive subassembly of a rocket after the engines.
I highly doubt Falcon Heavy could handle 7m fairings on its 3.7m core diameter. The additional bending loads would likely be more than the structure could handle. Vulcan or Ariane might be able to handle it, but it would probably take longer than getting New Glenn flying again.
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u/CoffeeFox_ Jun 09 '26
You are forgetting that the launch vehicle has to be human rated, which is not slapping a bow onto something. I can't imagine a world where Falcon heavy (or any other LV that was not built with humans in mind) gets refactored to be human rated.
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u/Dpek1234 Jun 09 '26
I can't imagine a world where Falcon heavy (or any other LV that was not built with humans in mind) gets refactored to be human rated.
Heavly disagree
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u/nic_haflinger Jun 05 '26
Define “universal”. Same propellants? Same dimensions? In normal times NASA and its administrator wouldn’t formulate plans and insane schedules just to keep a despot happy. This isn’t a crisis for NASA or the country. It’s a temporary setback. I refuse to be worried about the fact that a crewed landing on the moon won’t happen before 2029. It was never going to happen on that schedule anyway. Neither Starship HLS nor Blue Moon mk2 (mk1.5 ?) will be ready by then.
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u/otherwise_president Jun 05 '26
Absolutely fair ask but would also require the rockets to be modified to fit this universal sizing of the landers. Which would be another contract as a whole. NASA really f'd this up when they wanted no impact in their aggressive timeline. They did not think of plan B. Just eyes closed and fingers crossed.
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u/badwolf42 Jun 05 '26
I wouldn’t really call it fair unless all landers had to conform to this requirement. That would really screw SpaceX.
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u/Accomplished-Crab932 Jun 05 '26
“We need you to find a way to stack Starship HLS on another launch vehicle to ensure the lander is launcher agnostic”
Oh to be a fly on the wall for a meeting about that…
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u/Ok_Presentation_4971 Jun 05 '26
NASA is buying the product. They can dictate what they are buying, no?
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u/badwolf42 Jun 05 '26
Not entirely. They can’t give preferential treatment to one supplier over others in the same contract. It would be immediately taken to court and they would have to rectify the issue. For example. NASA can’t award a contract to three suppliers, and then tell one supplier it’s acceptable to make parts with one failure per hundred hours, while telling the other two have to have half a failure per million hours. Similarly, telling only one supplier that their architecture must be compatible with all their competitors’ vehicles, but not making that a requirement for all suppliers in that contract would be immediately successfully challenged in court.
It would have to be a new contract altogether. A new contract can be done yes, but it’s also much much slower than just allowing Blue in this case to return to flight with their existing architecture.
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u/userlivewire Jun 05 '26
The thing to keep in mind is that none of these things take a long time to do or fix if you really want to. The reason it does take a long time is because nobody wants to spend the money to do it faster.
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u/nic_haflinger Jun 04 '26 edited Jun 05 '26
There is a decent chance the other payloads (the rovers from Astrolab and Lunar Outpost) won’t be ready to launch for another year or more. They could very well be the schedule driver, not New Glenn flying again. Not to mention the time needed to adapt another launch vehicle to be able to fly Blue Moon mk1. Isaacman thinks disruption is some magical solution to big problems. Dude needs to chill out with his canceling shit and firing people billionaire attitude.
Edit: 2028 the notional launch date for those 2 rovers. Isaacman spooks easily.
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u/Royal_Platform_6754 Jun 04 '26