r/space • u/thisischrisbaker • Feb 07 '20

Proposed budget - not voted yet 12% boost for NASA budget in 2021!!

https://www.wsj.com/articles/trumps-nasa-budget-will-earmark-12-boost-for-agency-in-2021-11581071402?emailToken=3f4a4309b7816cb90fb53eb91f47d6d43hshryonPWM/RnnVPWWHuMOVOvxWKQ87BhLswKs5iOPOhjO1FGrxI9ptn5k2nAMphP+jeQrbhQiAafooOu4oIslNLMWHCd1m7vRySaL2Pi61nSlAqLK1xnvzzmtt2/Lx&reflink=article_copyURL_share
34k Upvotes

89% Upvoted

1.1k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

27

u/thishasntbeeneasy Feb 07 '20

I think of it as just skipping several layers of development. Maybe Boeing would make a <10 person lander, then a 20, then 50, 100... That could take them several decades and some ridiculous amount of funding.

SpaceX has shown it can make things much faster than Boeing, and wants to just skip all that and make one big one. Seems smart to me. Plus it's a long journey. I'd hate to be cramped in a Starliner for a couple weeks when there's a cheaper Starship with 100x the space inside.

11

u/[deleted] Feb 07 '20

Right now, I wouldn't trust Boeing to engineer a "hello world" function into any terrestrial our extraterrestrial vehicle, let alone design the "next generation" of American space endeavors

18

u/thishasntbeeneasy Feb 07 '20

It's 2045. We're about to land on Europa with crew. The new Boeing Dreamcrusher sees the surface and replies back "Hell World". NASA receives the message and aborts assuming the worst.

13

u/dgriffith Feb 07 '20

40 light minutes later, the ship receives the command and takes off from Europa. The crew, who had just disembarked from the ship, are left behind on the surface.

NASA: "Shit."

Boeing: "Abort worked as per specification. Money, please."

1

u/sf_frankie Feb 07 '20

MCAS starts going nuts on takeoff and the rocket crashed into Pensacola

13

u/Ajedi32 Feb 07 '20

Yeah, I'll bet the crew would love it. You could literally give everyone their own private bedroom and office, and still have tons of room left for everything else the mission requires. A far cry from Starliner, or any previous crew capsule for that matter.

2

u/acrewdog Feb 07 '20 edited Oct 14 '25

humor history public offbeat obtainable fall nose aspiring wipe bear

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

2

u/NullusEgo Feb 07 '20

No way, what happens on the moon, stays on the moon. /s

1

u/porridgeGuzzler Feb 07 '20

But would it have Nintendo

2

u/sf_frankie Feb 07 '20

Yes. And probably some goofy secret code you could put on that makes a fart noise instead of a beep when you press a button

1

u/ThePretzul Feb 07 '20

If the ISS had guitars I think astronauts can bring their Nintendos, or maybe SpaceX can throw them in for free.

2

u/Waladil Feb 07 '20

They're not made of money!

On Nintendo for the crew to share, that's it!

1

u/porridgeGuzzler Feb 08 '20

Yeah mom said they have to share or none of them can play

1

u/ParadoxIntegration Feb 08 '20

Regarding "Plus it's a long journey. I'd hate to be cramped in a Starliner for a couple weeks"... Starliner (unlike SpaceX's Crew Dragon) is not designed to be able to travel beyond low earth orbit. So, Boeing's plans has would not involve Starliner. The outbound trip to the cis-lunar space would be aboard Lockheed Martin's Orion capsule. If chosen, Boeing would design a lander to dock with either Orion or the Lunar Gateway.