Author Topic: From End of Shuttle to DM-2 Overview (Read 5046 times)

Chris Bergin · « **on:** 04/28/2020 05:23 pm »

A bit of history of how we got here:

https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2020/04/from-shuttle-sadness-dragon-delight-regain-domestic-capability/

https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight/status/1255182142063226885

Vettedrmr · « **Reply #1 on:** 04/28/2020 05:39 pm »

Thanks for the article; stuff like this is what makes NSF so valuable to those of us that are mere enthusiasts (well, ok, me).

Have a good one,
Mike

MATTBLAK · « **Reply #2 on:** 04/29/2020 05:48 am »

It's a good article that sums the last decade or so quite well. When I read again how Constellation was a mis-handled muddle; I could weep. Hopefully; when DM-2 flies in a few weeks some of the melancholy we have felt about the slow progress we've seen will be washed away.

Rocket Science · « **Reply #3 on:** 04/29/2020 07:10 am »

There's poetry in the article title Chris and thank you for it. It's been such a long road so I am tempering my expectations. I've become so used to disappointment that I will save the celebrations until the EOM and safe return of the crew. I need to wrap my head around the fact that this is actually going to happen. Best wishes to SpaceX for a successful mission!

geza · « **Reply #4 on:** 04/29/2020 07:32 am »

Right, or wrong, Constellation was the last time, when I got excited about a NASA human spaceflight program. While I would have been even more happy with a Mars-centered appoach, I could accept the technical opinion of Mike Griffin that it should be a later step. He had a long-term vison and optimized the proposed architecture for that. His writings about his technical choices was crisp and exciting. Maybe, he made mistakes. (Maybe, envisioning an upper stage with SSME for Ares 1 was the big one?) And/or he did not receive the money he expected. Anyway, when the Augstine comission decided that a meaningful human beyond LEO program would require additional 3 billion/year, and the extra money did not materialise, I lost interest in the further iterrations of Apollo-On-Steroids with disposable rockets and spacecrafts. Either the revolutionary approach of SpX works, or human spaceflight has no sense, at least for now.