Main Engine Cut OffMark Albrecht joins me to talk about his time on the Trump 2024 Transition Team, the thinking behind some of the policy decisions we’re starting to see in the space and national security spheres, and more.
Donald Trump has been reelected President of the United States, and the main character of spaceflight, Elon Musk, is one of his top advisors. Some thoughts on where things may go from here, and a bit of my wishlist.
United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan debut went smoothly, but sluggish hardware integration raises doubts about meeting commitments, while Orion faces heat shield issues, potentially shaking up the Artemis manifest.
Let’s put it on display next to its only rightful partner, the A-3 Test Stand at Stennis. Both are $350 million monuments to dead-end plans.
All in all this seems like the right call. At a certain point, the risk of bigger delays coming from the process of fixing this issue is more than the risk on this particular flight. We have yet to see political support of Orion and SLS be eroded in any meaningful way, but every increasing delay has to catch up at some point.
A lot of big, long-running projects have faced delays recently, and it seems like as good a time as any to check in and share some related thoughts. I cover a lot in this one: the Orion PDU issue, Ariane 6, Japan’s H3, Dream Chaser, Vulcan, and New Glenn.
The failure is a loss of redundancy and not a total system failure, so they could decide to fly as is, but that is extremely not NASA, especially on such a high-profile mission like Artemis 1. The info Loren got is that there are a few ways to go about fixing the issue, but they all mean a months-long delay—between 4 and 9 months estimated—before Orion would be ready to meet SLS for flight.
Everything is super delayed. And I mean everything: H3, Ariane 6, Vega C, Orion, SLS, Dream Chaser, Vulcan, New Glenn.
After the bizarre departure of Doug Loverro and the epic triumph of SpaceX DM-2, this news makes perfect sense and I, like damn near everyone who follows space, am thrilled to see it.
I’ve got a special preview of MECO Headlines for the main feed this week, with news on Orion, NASA’s FY2020 budget, NEOCam’s legacy, Starship, and more.