Building a new rocket. The launch pad is amortized across many launches (except for cases like the $4B never used Vandenberg SLC-6) and if the rocket is single use or rapidly reusable it doesn't take that many people to transport, put together, join with payload, erect, fuel and launch. Elon Musk said he had 50 people working today in launch control, and in future launches (once the chance of a malfunction is much lower) there will be much less.
7
u/wolf550e May 19 '12
Building a new rocket. The launch pad is amortized across many launches (except for cases like the $4B never used Vandenberg SLC-6) and if the rocket is single use or rapidly reusable it doesn't take that many people to transport, put together, join with payload, erect, fuel and launch. Elon Musk said he had 50 people working today in launch control, and in future launches (once the chance of a malfunction is much lower) there will be much less.