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To translate: - the engineering team delivered on many goals along with 2 serious downtime incidents - the product team had too many people to please and prod

To translate: - the engineering team delivered on many goals along with 2 serious downtime incidents - the product team had too many people to please and produced insane requirements that ultimately failed to achieve most (all?) of the goals of the platform versus just using rockets.

akira2501 2y ago
> failed to achieve most (all?) of the goals of the platform This is precisely the attitude I would argue against. The "goals of the platform" are meaningless predictions made by people before the thing even existed. This is a standard of measurement that's appropriate for bean counters and congress people who ultimately wanted and expected just a cheap commodity space bus.
- metabagel 2y ago
  Cheaper launch system means you can afford more missions, or do the same missions for less money. A smaller budget probably means less risk of Congress cutting your funding. On the other hand, the space shuttle was the coolest thing imaginable in the 80s. It was crazy that it could launch like a rocket and land like an airplane. My opinion now is that it was an unnecessarily complex, highly inefficient launch system. The issue that I have is that there should have been no requirement to carry cargo on the shuttle. Launch cargo on big dumb rockets, and launch and return people using a fancy space plane. The space plane would be smaller and likely not need booster rockets.
  - encoderer 2y ago
    Just imagined some historical fiction where the real reason the shuttle was built was to retrieve nuclear armed satellites we put into space in the 1960s. They always said the thing about being able to retrieve satellites with it but never really did… that they talked about.
    - badcppdev 2y ago
      Are you sure? https://www.space.com/34522-secret-shuttle-missions.html https://www.space.com/34522-secret-shuttle-missions.html
    - PopePompus 2y ago
      Yes, Hubble was supposed to be brought back to the Earth periodically for upgrades, but of course that never happened. Shuttle fans like to point to the Hubble servicing missions as proof of the spaceplane's value, but those servicing missions were probably more expensive than just launching a new space telescope to replace Hubble.
- encoderer 2y ago
  Well that is some “the journey is the reward” thinking. We designed, funded and built the thing to do something specific. It didn’t really do that. A goal is not a meaningless prediction. Outcomes matter.
- canadianfella 2y ago
  [dead]

akira2501 2y ago

> failed to achieve most (all?) of the goals of the platform This is precisely the attitude I would argue against. The "goals of the platform" are meaningless predictions made by people before the thing even existed. This is a standard of measurement that's appropriate for bean counters and congress people who ultimately wanted and expected just a cheap commodity space bus.

metabagel 2y ago
Cheaper launch system means you can afford more missions, or do the same missions for less money. A smaller budget probably means less risk of Congress cutting your funding. On the other hand, the space shuttle was the coolest thing imaginable in the 80s. It was crazy that it could launch like a rocket and land like an airplane. My opinion now is that it was an unnecessarily complex, highly inefficient launch system. The issue that I have is that there should have been no requirement to carry cargo on the shuttle. Launch cargo on big dumb rockets, and launch and return people using a fancy space plane. The space plane would be smaller and likely not need booster rockets.
- encoderer 2y ago
  Just imagined some historical fiction where the real reason the shuttle was built was to retrieve nuclear armed satellites we put into space in the 1960s. They always said the thing about being able to retrieve satellites with it but never really did… that they talked about.
  - badcppdev 2y ago
    Are you sure? https://www.space.com/34522-secret-shuttle-missions.html https://www.space.com/34522-secret-shuttle-missions.html
  - PopePompus 2y ago
    Yes, Hubble was supposed to be brought back to the Earth periodically for upgrades, but of course that never happened. Shuttle fans like to point to the Hubble servicing missions as proof of the spaceplane's value, but those servicing missions were probably more expensive than just launching a new space telescope to replace Hubble.
encoderer 2y ago
Well that is some “the journey is the reward” thinking. We designed, funded and built the thing to do something specific. It didn’t really do that. A goal is not a meaningless prediction. Outcomes matter.
canadianfella 2y ago
[dead]