Nah, I don’t think those two things really have that much to do with each other. Humans have always expanded their geographical range locally to get away from local problems or to get hold of nearby resources. And that behavior has definitely had a huge impact on human history and survival, true.
And humans have often taken shots at expanding their geographical range by longer voyages when short hops weren’t feasible, as in the original settlement of the Pacific Islands. Similarly, they’ve often made long journeys to follow long migration paths of prey animals or to optimize the feeding of domesticated animals. Which has also been very historically important, natch. And adventure and curiosity have always been part of the human psyche, leading to various challenges and journeys for their own sake.
But the concept of “because it’s there” as a sort of blanket principle mandating “exploration”—the notion that humans must or should go everywhere they conceivably can go, whether or not it’s a practically useful destination or more trouble than it’s worth—is AFAICT not a human universal, and in fact is pretty modern. There are lots of mountain summits, for example, that were theoretically accessible to local populations for thousands of years but never climbed until modern “explorers” deliberately chose that goal. Same for various parts of hot and cold deserts, uninhabited jungles, etc.
40 minute hold which is not nominal - there’s a problem with an engine chill. Hopefully it’s still go, but they will need to take more time taking it close to the end of the launch window.
Teams also are assessing what appears to be a crack in the thermal protection system material on one of the flanges on the core stage. The flanges are connection joints that function like a seam on a shirt, are affixed at the top and bottom of the intertank so the two tanks can be attached to it.
IMHO, “crack” <> good.
(especially on your flange)
I think it’s important to maintain an active space program. The lack of manned space flight over the last decade or so means that we have lost a decade of experience and know-how. The lessons learned and experience gained from going back to the moon and establishing a presence will benefit a future Mars mission, plus who know what we might learn.
As long as this thread is open, can someone tell me why space missions have “windows” when you can and can’t launch? Assuming the reason for the delay could be fixed by tomorrow, why couldn’t they launch tomorrow? After all, they know where the Moon will be tomorrow just as well as they know where it will be if they launch on Friday.
For this mission, from what I heard, the issue is that the spacecraft cannot be in the lunar shadow for more that 90 minutes at a time, or the lack of electricity generated by the panels causes everything to shut down.
There are only limited times in the lunar cycle when the trajectory allows this.
My understanding from reading Heinlein in middle school is that fuel and trajectory are calculated for the optimal relationship between launch site on earth and orbit injection point at moon, while both are zipping around in space at varying distances.
Yes and no. At this point, SLS is purely a political program. Technical considerations don’t really enter into it.
But at the same time, the Artemis program as a whole depends on the SpaceX Starship. It’s the lunar landing and ascent craft, and furthermore the proposal essentially requires reusability.
Starship, in the next few years, will not be human-rated for Earth launch. So there is still a need for another rocket and capsule system. SLS and Orion do, finally, exist, and will serve this purpose. In principle, they could have chosen a Falcon 9 with Crew Dragon, but that was never really going to happen given the politics. And Orion is a larger and more comfortable ride.
The current approach is probably the best that can be expected. Congress gets their delicious pork. SLS+Orion still serve a purpose, giving NASA a “win”. SpaceX does the hard part with Starship at a legitimately good price for the taxpayer, with the side effect of contributing toward development–which will also help for Mars. And we go to the Moon!
Expected article from Ars Technica:
Basically this was the first test of engine cool down.
There is still a chance that it will launch Friday – if not we will have to wait until mid October. NASA will decide tomorrow.
Brian
note that even if everything was fine with the rocket, WX may have scrubbed the launch
