Space is lonely. Two NASA astronauts have been stranded on the International Space Station since June 6th. International Coverage, Neil deGrasse Tysonand possibly alienThe astronauts initially boarded the Boeing Starliner spacecraft. First manned mission.
Starliner The plane landed safely. It returned to Earth in the early hours of September 7th. There was just one problem: There were no astronauts on board. NASA had not yet confirmed the details of the return of the spacecraft. The risk is too highThe astronauts will be trapped in space until 2025. NASA and Boeing must take full responsibility for their failure and ensure such a space disaster never happens again.
It's time for America's space agency to do the right thing for our astronauts and stop keeping the fuse burning on federal waste.
Boeing's Starliner has been plagued with problems since its inception, with the embarrassing failure beginning in 2014. Sign the contract It partnered with Boeing and SpaceX to develop spacecraft to carry astronauts into orbit, and NASA was understandably unhappy that taxpayers were paying the Russian Space Agency to do so. $86 million per trip NASA was planning to launch American astronauts into space and wanted more control over the process. Paid Boeing paid $4.2 billion, SpaceX $2.6 billion, and the agency justified paying the premium to Boeing on nostalgia and familiarity alone.
Starliner's maiden voyage was originally scheduled for 2017, but engineering delays meant The ship was anchored on landWhen Starliner was finally “ready” for unmanned flight in late 2019, a software error caused it to go off course and the mission failed. A second attempt in 2021 was thwarted by corroded valves, followed by problems with the parachute system, wiring issues, and more valve problems, delaying crewed flights until 2024.
Meanwhile, costs are soaring and taxpayers are An additional $600 million It provided funding to Boeing for the development of Starliner, and Boeing $1.5 billion Despite these setbacks and growing taxpayer concern about its own cost overruns, NASA is keeping its cool.
This debacle is only part of NASA's financial challenges. Artemis 3 Mission It aims to put humans on the Moon for the first time since the Apollo missions, with Artemis 4 planned to transport astronauts to a new lunar space station. These missions won't be cheap. In congressional testimony in January, NASA Acting Inspector General George Scott said: Estimation The total cost of the Artemis program through 2025 could exceed $93 billion, and that doesn't include tens of billions of dollars in research and development costs or unexpected costs associated with a lunar space station.
Space spending through 2030 will almost certainly exceed $100 billion, but clear estimates are few and far between. As Scott points out, “Until estimates are available, decision makers will have limited knowledge of the full scope of costs.”
Meanwhile, delays are plentiful. In January, NASA officials said Officially fired The launch of Artemis 3 has been postponed from late 2025 to September 2026, citing technical and safety delays, and the Government Accountability Office appears to expect further delays. November Report “If development takes as long as the average for NASA's major projects, the Artemis 3 mission will likely take place in early 2027,” the watchdog group said.
Instead, the project has been unusually slow, with “some flight testing delayed” and “a significant amount of complex work remaining.”
Policymakers will be more realistic and realize that robotic exploration can complete missions in a fraction of the time and cost required for human exploration, said Martin Rees, professor of cosmology and astrophysics at the University of Cambridge and Astronomer Royal. Take proper notes“Actual case [for human spaceflight] “With advances in robotics and miniaturization, it is becoming increasingly weaker,” the US space agency said. I seem to agree.“Robots don't need to eat, sleep or go to the bathroom. They can survive in space for years and can be left there without ever having to return!”
Robotic exploration is a much better alternative to leaving astronauts in space, Expose This will lead to all kinds of adverse health effects. It's time for NASA to do the right thing for its astronauts and stop keeping the fuse burning on federal waste.
