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Does anyone else feel super excited? I guess this was the feeling my parents had when they watched men landing on the Moon...

S_A_P 6y ago
I'll admit I went and looked at SpaceX open positions...
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- DarmokJalad1701 6y ago
  I do that every other month
- lutorm 6y ago
  There are tons of software openings! If you're excited about space, go check out https://www.spacex.com/careers https://www.spacex.com/careers.
mempko 6y ago
Today is a melancholy feeling. Happy to see SpaceX sending people to space, but sad a decade was lost. EDIT: I spoke about that we had a regression, I meant that NASA lost a capability and just got it back.
- randomsearch 6y ago
  Untrue
- bpodgursky 6y ago
  I understand this sentiment, but if SpaceX pulls this off, it's going to be an order of magnitude cheaper and more sustainable than the incredibly awesome but one-off and flashy Apollo (or even shuttle) missions. Crew Dragon is not visually BIGGER than a Saturn V, but it is in a lot of ways a firmer footstep into space than we've ever taken before. SpaceX's program isn't going to dry up as soon as the cold war is over, and we stop devoting 5% of GDP to beating the Soviets. This is for real.
  - e2021 6y ago
    > it's going to be an order of magnitude cheaper Soyuz is $60m per passenger I think? Are they saying dragon would be $6m per passenger per launch? I find that hard to believe...
    - bpodgursky 6y ago
      Soyuz has done a good job of making spaceflight routine, but unfortunately it's a bit of a dead end (if only for political / organizational reasons, but also the technology hasn't been updated in decades). I was directly comparing to the Shuttle, which cost more like $450mm per launch. And yeah, maybe Crew Dragon won't drop to $6mm, but Starship (next) pretty plausibly could, if it works.
      - NikolaeVarius 6y ago
        The RD-180 is an extremely high performance engine. It first flew in 2000.
        simonh 6y ago
        I think that comment was aimed at the architecture. Soon all non-reusable systems will be out of date.
    - simonh 6y ago
      You cut off the bit where it was made clear that was in comparison to the Apollo and Shuttle missions. Please don’t knowingly take quotes out of context and use them like that. It’s really unpleasant behaviour.
- logicx24 6y ago
  There hasn't been a regression, but priorities changed. NASA is a government agency and is thus subject to politics. But make no mistake, we are ahead of where we were in the 1960's, both technologically and organizationally (i.e. a private company achieving spaceflight). This is unequivocally a step forward.
- jccooper 6y ago
  This is actually a brand new capability for NASA: human spaceflight that isn't ruinously expensive.
  - mempko 6y ago
    Federal government has no limits to spending. This isn't about cost, it's about privatizing space the same way the internet was privatized. Take technology developed in the public sector and allow the private sector to take it. With the privatization of space, you will get both the same upsides and downsides of privatization. The only difference between the past, where NASA paid private contractors to build Apollo and the Shuttle is now they are paying a private contractor (SpaceX) but SpaceX gets to sell the tech for others to use besides the government.
    - bulldoa 6y ago
      people are usually against privatization when there is conflict of interest, what is the conflict of interest in this case?
- paulsutter 6y ago
  Our parents didn't have privately-owned reusable spaceflight. Just wait till you see Starship.
- randomsearch 6y ago
  Untrue, because: 60 years ago was 1960. There were no space stations to dock with. If your parents were American: no Americans had been in space. But most importantly rockets were not reusable. That is why this has never been done before.
- jacquesm 6y ago
  A decade? More than four decades. The shuttle was never really about anything else than near earth orbits, this is the first time in a very long time that we are just possibly looking to expand the envelope.
Melting_Harps 6y ago
> Does anyone else feel super excited? I guess this was the feeling my parents had when they watched men landing on the Moon... Very! I couldn't sleep last night; I haven't had this feeling since i was at the Mars Desert Research Station, and Falcon Heavy launch before that! Its kind of bitter sweet as I'd prefer to be at Hawthorne HQ or the Texas launch facility for this, though. The Cape would be even better, but still, I wanted to see this with the crew(s) so much.
throw7 6y ago
(looks like they scrubbed today's launch...) I was never really excited about space shuttle launches when I was kid. After the challenger disaster (i was in middle school at the time and remember my science teacher in tears), I just didn't care about space at all. But something happened watching those two falcon boosters land... i don't know, i got real emotional. Yes, I'm excited.

S_A_P 6y ago

I'll admit I went and looked at SpaceX open positions...

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
DarmokJalad1701 6y ago
I do that every other month
lutorm 6y ago
There are tons of software openings! If you're excited about space, go check out https://www.spacex.com/careers https://www.spacex.com/careers.

mempko 6y ago

Today is a melancholy feeling. Happy to see SpaceX sending people to space, but sad a decade was lost. EDIT: I spoke about that we had a regression, I meant that NASA lost a capability and just got it back.

randomsearch 6y ago
Untrue
bpodgursky 6y ago
I understand this sentiment, but if SpaceX pulls this off, it's going to be an order of magnitude cheaper and more sustainable than the incredibly awesome but one-off and flashy Apollo (or even shuttle) missions. Crew Dragon is not visually BIGGER than a Saturn V, but it is in a lot of ways a firmer footstep into space than we've ever taken before. SpaceX's program isn't going to dry up as soon as the cold war is over, and we stop devoting 5% of GDP to beating the Soviets. This is for real.
- e2021 6y ago
  > it's going to be an order of magnitude cheaper Soyuz is $60m per passenger I think? Are they saying dragon would be $6m per passenger per launch? I find that hard to believe...
  - bpodgursky 6y ago
    Soyuz has done a good job of making spaceflight routine, but unfortunately it's a bit of a dead end (if only for political / organizational reasons, but also the technology hasn't been updated in decades). I was directly comparing to the Shuttle, which cost more like $450mm per launch. And yeah, maybe Crew Dragon won't drop to $6mm, but Starship (next) pretty plausibly could, if it works.
    - NikolaeVarius 6y ago
      The RD-180 is an extremely high performance engine. It first flew in 2000.
      - simonh 6y ago
        I think that comment was aimed at the architecture. Soon all non-reusable systems will be out of date.
  - simonh 6y ago
    You cut off the bit where it was made clear that was in comparison to the Apollo and Shuttle missions. Please don’t knowingly take quotes out of context and use them like that. It’s really unpleasant behaviour.
logicx24 6y ago
There hasn't been a regression, but priorities changed. NASA is a government agency and is thus subject to politics. But make no mistake, we are ahead of where we were in the 1960's, both technologically and organizationally (i.e. a private company achieving spaceflight). This is unequivocally a step forward.
jccooper 6y ago
This is actually a brand new capability for NASA: human spaceflight that isn't ruinously expensive.
- mempko 6y ago
  Federal government has no limits to spending. This isn't about cost, it's about privatizing space the same way the internet was privatized. Take technology developed in the public sector and allow the private sector to take it. With the privatization of space, you will get both the same upsides and downsides of privatization. The only difference between the past, where NASA paid private contractors to build Apollo and the Shuttle is now they are paying a private contractor (SpaceX) but SpaceX gets to sell the tech for others to use besides the government.
  - bulldoa 6y ago
    people are usually against privatization when there is conflict of interest, what is the conflict of interest in this case?
paulsutter 6y ago
Our parents didn't have privately-owned reusable spaceflight. Just wait till you see Starship.
randomsearch 6y ago
Untrue, because: 60 years ago was 1960. There were no space stations to dock with. If your parents were American: no Americans had been in space. But most importantly rockets were not reusable. That is why this has never been done before.
jacquesm 6y ago
A decade? More than four decades. The shuttle was never really about anything else than near earth orbits, this is the first time in a very long time that we are just possibly looking to expand the envelope.

Melting_Harps 6y ago

> Does anyone else feel super excited? I guess this was the feeling my parents had when they watched men landing on the Moon... Very! I couldn't sleep last night; I haven't had this feeling since i was at the Mars Desert Research Station, and Falcon Heavy launch before that! Its kind of bitter sweet as I'd prefer to be at Hawthorne HQ or the Texas launch facility for this, though. The Cape would be even better, but still, I wanted to see this with the crew(s) so much.

throw7 6y ago

(looks like they scrubbed today's launch...) I was never really excited about space shuttle launches when I was kid. After the challenger disaster (i was in middle school at the time and remember my science teacher in tears), I just didn't care about space at all. But something happened watching those two falcon boosters land... i don't know, i got real emotional. Yes, I'm excited.