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silence7 @slrpnk.net

1w ago

Proposed 24 percent cut to NASA budget eliminates key Artemis architecture, climate research

spaceflightnow.com

Proposed 24 percent cut to NASA budget eliminates key Artemis architecture, climate research – Spaceflight Now

8 comments

So, tl;Dr
The Mars sample return has been shitcanned
The lunar gateway orbiter (or was it a transitor?) has been shitcanned, or at least our funding for it has. There are other internation partners that we're leaving on the hook here.
Artemis and Orion got dumpstered past Artemis III in favor of "more competitive commercial launch systems". I'll give you one guess who that contract is going to go to, though that's not part of this announcement.
No mention of the Roman space telescope, but climate monitoring satellites got the boot too
Human space exploration is prioritized in the new budget, with 6 billion to work towards establishing a lunar base and 1 billion for human mars exploration (lol, lmao even. Here's a hundred dollars to go explore the Pacific, have fun, kiddo)
- To be fair, the whole Artemis program was a bit of a dumpster fire. Needlessly complex architecture when we could have just yeeted like three or four pieces into space with Falcon Heavy, assembled in orbit, and then landed/returned with a traditional lunar landing vehicle.
  
  So I've heard, but I think I heard recently that NASA had made a lot of headway getting to program on track, and it was supposed to have a heavier payload than even starship by a good margin. It's basically a modern Saturn V program. Idk, I'm skeptical that it was dumpstered based on evidence and that this wasn't just a handy premise for setting up more gibs for Elon.

TBF, there’s so many basics that we don’t get right that sometimes I wonder if we are ready for space exploration or if we have more work do at home first.
Our leadership does not understand vaccines. We can’t handle people of differing opinions than ourselves. It seems so primitive.

Here's the thing with NASA, most of the bases are located in Republican states so they're more willing to fight against budget cuts.
We'll have to see if they have any actual backbone to fight against these fascists, but it's more hopeful than other departments.
- I'm hoping they can find their balls, because I like our space program. :/

8 comments