Trip, Trip, Rocket Ship

[Edgy MD]

I've been paying attention to the space program in anticipation of our scheduled return to the Moon, and possibly further in the near future, and was disappointed to see tonight's Boeing/NASA mission. Boeing's crewed flight test of Starliner, it's hopefully going to get Boeing something of a win and a past SpaceX as a favored NASA contractor, as their civilian commercial aeronautics division is feeling a lot of humiliation


It's an interesting throwback milestone mission, being the 100th Atlas V Launch, the first launch of humans on an Atlas V, the first launch of humans from Cape Canaveral SFS since Apollo 7 in October 1968, and first launch of humans on an Atlas vehicle since Gordon Cooper on Mercury-Atlas 9 on May 15, 1963.

Exciting stuff, literally returning to the old school, that hopefully won't be pushed back past tomorrow night. The crew of two was scheduled to spend a week at the International Space Station and do a ground landing on return.

All this is expected to lead to Artemis 3, scheduled to be, in September 2026, the first crewed moon landing since Apollo 17 in 1972.

One thing NASA sure hasn't improved in the last 50+ years are their crew portraits.

[metirish]

I'm finding it hard to get excited for any of these missions, especially Boeing , years behind as it stands

[Edgy MD]

I dunno if they're years behind or the SpaceX and Vigin Galactic programs are right where they are, but while Boeing and NASA delay the launch when a red light comes on, the hotshot Musk and Branson guys just say "Fuck it" and blast off.

The Chinese are launching a mission seemingly every day and we're still looking at getting back to the moon before they touch down there, so yeah, I'm excited about that. Going to the moon with contemporary cameras and stuff is going to be pretty fun.

Mars in my lifetime, Baby!

[Edgy MD]

Starliner launch rescheduled for May 17 as they haul in the rocket to change a suspect valve.

I tried to convince them to let Chewbacca do it mid-flight, but alas.

[Frayed Knot]

I'm usually into this stuff but it's still a ways away as the eventual moon launch is projected but still not scheduled
so I'm not in full following mode yet. On the plus side it looks like they'll get back up there while there are still a
few of the previous moon visitors still alive. Until very recently I wasn't sure that was going to be the case.