Well, China’s approach seems very rational and is well under way (link). It seems quite possible that a Chinese crew will land on the Moon first. If that happens, and especially if they use the old Soviet approach of just announcing it after they succeed, expect to see lots of claims of “fake” and “AI” in the West.
Two years ago I put the whole crew on my Celebrity Death Pool list (I called it a moonshot), but then they cancelled the flight. I did not include them the year after that, and this year I forgot to look it up. If I had remembered, I would have included them in my list for this year again. The four of them should add up to ~200 points, enough to win the game, or come close.
The Chinese are not stupid. Now that they know how meshugge some conspiracy folks can be they will make sure, while they are up there, that it can be verified from Earth in real time without the shadow of a doubt. I am confident they will think of something convincing. Maybe involving TikTok and some challenge.
I feel exactly the same way. It’s hard to get excited about a botched program that’s trying (badly) to achieve something that was already done with such excellence over 46 years ago, and with much more primitive technology.
Is it because the State of the Union address is set for February 24? This has shades of the launch of Challenger to be in time of Reagan’s SOTU, in spite of freezing temperatures and their effect on O-rings. That didn’t turn out well.
The Apollo program was in some sense rushed, too, in order to meet Kennedy’s deadline of putting a man on the moon before the end of the decade. But it was well staffed, well funded, and competently managed. Not sure I can say the same about this iteration, especially with Elon Musk involved.
As for Challenger and then Columbia, I’ve long felt that the whole space shuttle concept was a kluge and it looked like it, and that the whole manned space program was a shambles after Apollo, though NASA did brilliant stuff with their unmanned programs. I still think unmanned robotics is the future.
If Artemis 3 happens before the end of 2028, I fully expect Trump to demand they put a golden plaque with his name on it on the Moon.
Now there are concerns about the heat shield, but NASA looks poised to launch anyway. You’d think that after the 2003 Columbia, they’d be hyper-wary of anything involving a less-than-perfect heat shield.
Another view of the heat shield problem from the Arstechnica writer who was invited to the Isaacman meeting.
If they think that, then they obviously don’t know how meshugge some conspiracy folks can be !
It’s a no-win scenario. Ignore them, and they’ll make up stuff to believe; interact with them, and they’ll wonder why you’re trying to hard to convince them it’s real.
I don’t see the need for this particular mission at this time. Better to test the heat shield again in an unmanned mission than to roll the dice on the heat shield with four lives on the table. The orbital mechanics of a trip around the moon and return are well established, not sure what is to be gained by the mission except to brag about this crew being the furthest from Earth in history by virtue of the planned path.
For a while it has looked like someone decided SLS/Orion just has to go on ‘cause we’re too far in to back off now and we’ve got nothing else in the pipeline to keep the favored contractors in business.
Everything is a risk. TPTB have to weigh that risk against the potential rewards, and they get paid the big bucks to make those decisions. There will always be some political pressure on missions like these. I hope it’s not unduly strong pressure. If you wait until there are zero defects and no risk, nothing will ever be done.
I know everyone here knows this. I feel it needs to be said. If TPTB eff it up, there’ll be hell to pay.
I for one am excited about this. I certainly hope it goes well and I hope all four return safely with a successful mission.
Yes, I’ve been waiting for us to do more space exploration my whole life. I’m extremely excited for the (not so) new lunar landing program and for humans to walk on the moon again right when my kids are at the perfect age to get inspired by this.
Probably already mentioned upthread, but this upcoming Artemis II in just a few days will break the record for 1) fastest speed humans have ever traveled and 2) furthest distance humans have ever traveled. Are there any other records that will be broken as well? Perhaps hottest reentry ever, assuming that since this will be the fastest-speed reentry, the temperature will be correspondingly hot as well?
Hottest reentry ever? If they break Columbia’s record I will be really sorry for not putting them on my celebrity death pool list, as I did (too soon) two years ago.
Hottest successful reentry.
They managed to come down in the end, right? And disproved on the way down the saying acccording to which “it’s not the falling, it’s the sudden stop at the end that kills you”. Small success, but better than nothing.
Survivable?
You got me there 