[HN Gopher] NASA Artemis II moon mission live launch broadcast
___________________________________________________________________
NASA Artemis II moon mission live launch broadcast
Author : apitman
Score : 403 points
Date : 2026-04-01 17:11 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (plus.nasa.gov)
(TXT) w3m dump (plus.nasa.gov)
| rpozarickij wrote:
| Direct livestream link:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tf_UjBMIzNo
| dotancohen wrote:
| I tuned in for 60 seconds, the presenter got everything wrong,
| and I just tuned out until liftoff.
|
| She called the top of the ET (well, it's no longer an ET, but
| it's the stage that was the STS ET) the "upper stage". She said
| that the propellents are stored at thousands of degrees below
| zero. And so on. This is a NASA presenter?
| chasd00 wrote:
| i'm sure the whole talk track was piped through an AI for
| clarity and excitement and the presenters were told to read
| the script.
| rdevilla wrote:
| You are not the target audience for this sort of
| presentation. Media directed at the laity is more about being
| directionally than quantifiably correct, and is full of
| metaphor and embellishment to capture the imagination rather
| than communicate something with precision.
|
| People who want the actual details and numbers will read.
| robotresearcher wrote:
| I firmly believe you can have both exciting, inspiring, and
| factually correct communication if you make that a
| priority.
|
| The experience of hearing factual things presented with
| passion and obvious expertise is in itself inspiring. Why
| settle for less?
| jeffrallen wrote:
| Bring back John Insprucker.
| tigerlily wrote:
| I for one am begging God that this is merely April fools
| all the way down.
| lukan wrote:
| If it would be, then a fake explosion after start as
| climax before revealing it, would be quite a joke.
| Probably will yield mixed reception, though.
| magicalist wrote:
| > _She called the top of the ET (well, it 's no longer an ET,
| but it's the stage that was the STS ET) the "upper stage".
| She said that the propellents are stored at thousands of
| degrees below zero. And so on. This is a NASA presenter?_
|
| To be fair to her, she seemed to explicitly refer to what
| sits _on top_ of the core stage, it just wasn 't in the
| diagram she was gesturing to the top of at the time.
|
| To be fair to you, I think the cryogenic comment was worse
| and she actually said "thousands of degrees below
| Fahrenheit".
|
| The problem is they're trying to run hours of programming
| leading up to this launch for some reason, but aren't willing
| to force the experts to come in to do the commentary. They
| should have given her a script.
| Am4TIfIsER0ppos wrote:
| Jesus! Why is there a presenter? Why isn't it just a
| livestream of the mission control radio chatter? That sort
| of shit belongs on some 24/7 news broadcast.
| gm678 wrote:
| Same reason the livestream mentioned jobs about a dozen
| times in the 10 minutes I watched, NASA is in a fraught
| position and this is their way of fighting for some
| continued funding. A 'mass media' event captures more
| attention than a minimalist stream of chatter. (And a
| less cynical interpretation is also that getting the
| public interested in and engaged with space missions is
| part of their mandate.)
| birdsongs wrote:
| I feel like they really fumbled the video feeds, it was a mess.
| Rapid shifting of camera angles as it left the pad, black
| video, switching to a grainy video of the crowd during booster
| separation, and a hasty switch back well after they separated.
|
| Come on guys. You're going to the moon. You couldn't plan the
| launch camera / video feed better? This is how the world sees
| it, gets excited about it.
| erelong wrote:
| predicting malfunctioning systems (just a guess)
| barbazoo wrote:
| polymarket or gtfo :)
| chasd00 wrote:
| My opinion is 60/40 in favor of launch today. It's not
| unusual at all for something to come up in the final 10-30
| minutes.
|
| Kalshi is more optimistic.
| https://kalshi.com/markets/kxartemisii/artemis-ii-launch-
| dat...
| LorenDB wrote:
| It's been 54 years since humans last visited the Moon. Hopefully,
| in a few years we will get boots back on the surface.
| CoastalCoder wrote:
| Out of curiosity, why do you see this as a worthwhile endeavor?
|
| My personal perspective is that the resources are better used
| for other purposes, but it's possible that I just haven't
| encountered some compelling reason yet.
| xattt wrote:
| The moonshot is a halo program that, when executed in a non-
| profit form, ends up benefiting society as a whole due to
| smart people being cornered and forced to solve hard problems
| that typically have applicability elsewhere on Earth.
|
| Edit: remember the Kennedy speech -- We choose to go to the
| moon not because it is easy, but because we thought it would
| be easy.
| WalterBright wrote:
| > when executed in a non-profit form
|
| For-profits are of no benefit to society? Are SpaceX
| rockets a loser for society?
| anonymous_user9 wrote:
| > Are SpaceX rockets a loser for society?
|
| That remains to be seen. By giving Musk the prominence to
| set up DOGE and destroy USAID, they've indirectly led to
| the deaths of almost a million people.
|
| By launching starlink, they're also increasing the amount
| of aluminum in the upper atmosphere, which may have
| catastrophic effects on the ozone layer.
| WalterBright wrote:
| Do government non-profit spacecraft not use aluminum?
|
| SpaceX rockets also are re-usable, which is
| environmentally better. They also cost about 10% of what
| non-profit rockets cost to launch.
|
| > they've indirectly led to the deaths of almost a
| million people.
|
| DOGE is a non-profit entity. Besides, why can't other
| non-profit governments pick up the aid?
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| To your last point, because DOGE shut down programs in a
| such a way as to make that impossible, to the point they
| chose to let food rot, let medicines go bad, and stranded
| Americans overseas working on the projects without a way
| home.
| xattt wrote:
| Specific innovations tend to be protected via IP when
| they are developed privately and, as a result, "butterfly
| effect" developments in a completely different field from
| cross-pollination are less likely to occur later down the
| line.
| WalterBright wrote:
| Patents expire. Also, engineers are pretty good about
| working around patents. Look at all the various AI
| implementations, for example.
|
| P.S. I oppose patents.
| LightBug1 wrote:
| Maybe ... depends on the net net ... some people have
| internet access and can throw some satellites into space
| ... on the other hand, wealth and influence accrues to a
| specific kind of destabilising wanker
| chasd00 wrote:
| > Out of curiosity, why do you see this as a worthwhile
| endeavor?
|
| to me it's inspiring and gives people something to cheer for.
| It also keeps a lot of people employed, productive, and at
| least has the possibility for new innovation. When looking at
| the mountains and mountains of wasted taxpayer dollars I
| dislike these the least.
| nancyminusone wrote:
| Do you watch sports, football, the Olympics? If not I'm sure
| you know someone who does. Same category as this. Each of the
| 32 NFL team is worth about the cost of 1-2 Artemis launches.
| The entire league could fund the whole Artemis program nearly
| twice. Hosting the Olympics is worth about 3-10 launches.
|
| Like sports, the objective is ultimately useless except as a
| showcase of what humanity has to offer, and people like to
| see that.
| runarberg wrote:
| I think there is a major difference though. Sports events
| are not pretending to be anything else. The Artemis mission
| claims to be advancing science and claims to be a stepping
| stone for an eventual moon base and a manned mission to
| Mars. I personally have serious questions about all of
| these.
| bee_rider wrote:
| I don't have any questions about a mission to Mars, it is
| a stupid and pointless trip that I don't want to ask any
| questions about.
|
| The Moon, I dunno, it's at least in Earth's gravity well
| so it isn't like we're going totally the wrong direction
| when we go there, right?
|
| At best it could be a gas station on the trip to
| somewhere interesting like the Asteroid belt, though.
| runarberg wrote:
| Whether a moon base is needed or even beneficial is a
| question I have not heard a convincing answer in favor.
| And even if moon base is indeed needed and/or beneficial
| to future space exploration / resource extraction why
| robots cannot more efficiently build (or assemble) such a
| moon base is another question I need an answer to.
|
| We are sending humans to (or around) the moon now, but it
| may just turn out to be a wasted effort, done solely for
| the opulence (or more cynically bragging rights /
| nationalist propaganda).
| sarchertech wrote:
| We are nowhere near the capability to launch robots to
| the moon that can autonomously build or assemble a moon
| base for any useful definition of moon base.
|
| > We are sending humans to (or around) the moon now, but
| it may just turn out to be a wasted effort, done solely
| for the opulence
|
| My 4 year old is extremely excited to watch the launch
| tonight because it's manned. I'd say a few billion is
| worth it if all it does is inspire a new generation of
| astronauts, engineers, and scientists.
| runarberg wrote:
| And neither are we anywhere near the capability to lunch
| construction workers to the moon which can build or
| assemble an equivalent moon base with their human labor.
| So this answer does not satisfy me one bit.
|
| > inspire a new generation of astronauts, engineers, and
| scientists
|
| This is a good point. And I would like it to be true.
| However when you have to lie about (or exaggerate) the
| scientific value of the mission, that is not exactly
| inspiring is it. Your 4 year old could be equally
| inspired by the amazing photos James Webb has given us,
| and unlike Artemis, James Webb is providing us with
| unique data which is inspiring all sorts of new science.
| sarchertech wrote:
| > And neither are we anywhere near the capability to
| lunch construction workers to the moon which can build or
| assemble an equivalent moon base with their human labor.
| So this answer does not satisfy me one bit.
|
| We have the capability to do that. We don't have the will
| to do it, but we have the technology. We don't even have
| autonomous robots that are capable of building a moon
| base on earth.
|
| > Your 4 year old could be equally inspired by the
| amazing photos James Webb has given us, and unlike
| Artemis, James Webb is providing us with unique data
| which is inspiring all sorts of new science.
|
| He's not though. People gather around as a family and
| watch manned space missions. It's exciting in a way that
| a telescope or a probe isn't.
| adrian_b wrote:
| Indeed, in 1969, as a small child, I watched the Moon
| landing together with my parents, in Europe, like also
| the following missions, in the next years.
|
| They have certainly contributed to my formation as a
| future engineer.
| shash wrote:
| The key here is "could be". But most four (or in my case,
| six) year olds can't really grasp the abstract concepts
| of what JWST is or the data it's sending back. For that
| matter most 40 year olds can't.
|
| A manned mission on the other hand is tangible in a way a
| probe isn't. "See the big round thing in the night sky?
| There are four people going around it in a spacecraft".
|
| It isn't a _complete_ argument in favour of manned
| missions- that has to account for the risk of the
| endeavour and reward of the science potential of having
| people there to react in ways robots can't. But it's hard
| to pretend that the inspiration pretty much everyone
| feels when they see manned missions is somehow achievable
| purely by robotic ones.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _neither are we anywhere near the capability to lunch
| construction workers to the moon which can build or
| assemble an equivalent moon base with their human labor_
|
| Why do you say this? What is the bottleneck you feel we
| are more than half a decade from?
| hparadiz wrote:
| The moon has about the same make up as the Earth when it
| comes to distribution of elements in the crust. If it's
| anywhere near 8% like Earth then it makes sense to mine
| aluminum and other metals on the moon in order to build
| megastructures in orbit. Since the moon has no atmosphere
| you can accelerate things using mechanical mass drivers.
| Basically rail systems. At 5,300 mph you hit escape
| velocity and can then move payload somewhere with no
| rockets. It would keep us from polluting Earth too. This
| is the precursor to O'Neil cylinder type structures. AI
| robots will probably be the play but you still want a
| transportation system that works and frankly building a
| landing zone would improve overall outcomes regardless.
| adrian_b wrote:
| The rocks at the surface of the Moon are richer in metals
| than the crust of the Earth. They are especially richer
| in iron and titanium.
|
| Without oxidizing air, it is easier to extract metals
| from the Moon rocks.
|
| There is little doubt that it would be possible to build
| big spaceships on the Moon.
|
| However, what is missing on the Moon is fuel. For
| interplanetary spacecraft, nuclear reactors would be
| preferable anyway, which could be assembled there from
| parts shipped from Earth, but for propulsion those still
| need a large amount of some working gas,to be heated and
| ejected.
|
| It remains to be seen if there is any useful amount of
| water at the poles, but I doubt that there is enough for
| a long term exploitation.
| hparadiz wrote:
| I imagine a foundry would use solar power and lasers to
| heat up the material. No atmosphere means less heat
| energy wasted. My thinking has been how to get enough
| actual build material to build something like an O'Neill
| cylinder. Well you'd need really thick metal plates. And
| then you'd want to get them into orbit without rockets.
| And these stations would likely be at the same orbit as
| Earth or nearby. Mainly because of how much sun energy
| you get around here. Going out to the outer solar system
| is a different beast all together.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Whether a moon base is needed or even beneficial is a
| question I have not heard a convincing answer in favor_
|
| If we want to go to Mars, the Moon is a good place to
| learn. Simple things like how to do trauma medicine in
| low g; how to accommodate a variety of human shapes,
| sizes and fitness levels; how to do _in situ_
| manufacturing; all the way to more-speculative science
| like how to gestate a mammal. These are easier to do on
| the Moon than Mars. And the data are more meaningful than
| simulating it in LEO. If we get ISRU going, doing it on
| the Moon should actually be cheaper.
|
| If we don't want to colonize space, the Moon is mostly a
| vanity mission. That said, the forcing function of
| developing semi-closed ecologies almost certainly has
| sustainability side effects on the ground.
| foltik wrote:
| Do you really disagree that it's advancing science?
| Surely actually testing hardware, building knowledge on
| how to run this type of mission, learning to use lunar
| resources, figuring out how to keep people alive, etc.
| will teach us things we couldn't learn any other way.
|
| Fwiw do share your concerns about the methods (sending
| humans on this specific mission is questionable, SLS is
| questionable compared to SpaceX approach).
| duped wrote:
| Do you think we will learn more from Artemis or the
| Asteroid Redirect Mission? Because that's a concrete
| example of how funding this mission caused other
| experiments to be cancelled.
| foltik wrote:
| Fair point, but that's an argument about prioritization
| within NASA's budget (and its size relative to other
| spending), not the scientific value of the mission.
| duped wrote:
| There's never non-zero value to any challenging
| engineering problem. The question is whether the finite
| resources spent to solve it are best spent on it versus
| other projects.
|
| And in this mission in particular, you can't divorce
| science from politics. NASA's budget was reined in by
| Trump 45 and his admin picked Artemis because a manned
| mission to the moon invokes a particular feeling and
| memory, not because it benefits science. The moon is a
| known quantity, and going there is not more valuable than
| the other projects the government could have spent $100
| billion on.
|
| Keep in mind, this is one of the most expensive single
| launches in history while there is a partial government
| shutdown and the rest of the federal government that does
| real research has been gutted by this same
| administration. So it's tough to talk about "scientific
| value" when it's obvious that this mission is doing
| little science at the same time the government has
| decreed it won't be in the business of paying for
| science.
| foltik wrote:
| The moon isn't a known quantity, we sent a handful of
| people there for a combined few days half a century ago.
|
| If you're angry about this dumpster fire of an
| administration wasting money and gutting research (I am
| too), the answer is to fight for better funding across
| the board, not to tear down one of the few ambitious
| programs left that's actually pushing the boundaries on
| what we can do.
| palata wrote:
| It's not science, it's engineering. I don't think it's
| advancing science in a way that wouldn't be possible with
| a fraction of the cost without sending humans there.
| foltik wrote:
| The distinction is kind of meaningless, advancing our
| engineering capabilities in space _is_ advancing the
| science.
|
| And as I said, agreed on the concerns about cost and
| sending humans.
| nancyminusone wrote:
| The fact that we hope to get some new tech with this
| whereas sports aims for nothing is just icing on the
| cake. I think big space missions are worth it every now
| and then on a humanitarian level; even if no new
| discoveries are made, a new generation of engineers will
| become fluent in what we have already discovered.
| Humanity's education is not "done" when the last fact is
| written in a book, it needs to be constantly refreshed or
| it will disappear.
|
| Even in sports you do not get "nothing", it has certainty
| helped advance the field of medicine.
| runarberg wrote:
| > a new generation of engineers will become fluent in
| what we have already discovered.
|
| We seem to have lost the technology of going to the moon
| we gained from Apollo. So without an actual follow-up and
| a tangible long term plan I suspect the exact same will
| happen this time around.
| nancyminusone wrote:
| Yeah, that's probably an indication that we waited too
| long.
| runarberg wrote:
| Or, more likely, it is an indication that manned moon
| missions are simply not that important, that this
| technology is simply not worth the cost of maintaining.
|
| In contrast, we kept the technology of doing robotic
| missions in space, on the moon, and even on other planets
| and even asteroids (the latter two have much to improve
| upon though).
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _We seem to have lost the technology of going to the
| moon we gained from Apollo_
|
| Some of it. Much for good reason. What are you referring
| to that we've lost that we would want?
| ApolloFortyNine wrote:
| Even if you think Space travel is worth the money (which I
| personally do), adding humans to the mix makes projects
| incredibly more expensive. Even in the realm of space
| travel and research, sending humans is a questionable use
| of the money.
| post-it wrote:
| Sports would also be much cheaper without humans.
| zarzavat wrote:
| The most important (if not entertaining) things you can
| do in space don't involve humans. Telescopes,
| communications, earth observation, sending probes to
| distant bodies, etc.
|
| It's nice that we can send humans to space and it's good
| to keep that capability going so that the knowledge
| doesn't die. But the unmanned missions tend to pull the
| weight of actually accomplishing useful things. Humans
| just get in the way.
| pigpop wrote:
| Most people don't find those things interesting unless
| people are directly involved in them.
| wat10000 wrote:
| Turns out I don't understand the point sports either.
| edm0nd wrote:
| People are going to have to die in order for us to
| increase our space knowledge. It sucks but thats just how
| it be, it requires humans for most of it.
| Rebelgecko wrote:
| I think in general space exploration is a great use of
| taxpayer money, but the artemis program doesn't seem great
| from either a "science per dollar" or "novel accomplishment
| per dollar" standpoint.
|
| If the goal was just to flex on the rest of the world I
| would've much rather we focused on going somewhere _new_ or
| returning to the moon in a more sustainable way
| pj_mukh wrote:
| "returning to the moon in a more sustainable way"
|
| Isn't this the point of this mission? If your point is
| "it shouldn't take this much money", then I agree. But
| also point to almost everything else.
| runarberg wrote:
| I think that is the point, but whether this mission will
| actually do that is rather unconvincing.
|
| After (and if) Artemis III lands on the moon and brings
| home the astronauts there seems to be very little planned
| on how we actually get to the moon base which NASA is
| claiming this will lead to, let alone the manned Mars
| mission that is also supposed to follow.
|
| In other words, I think NASA is greatly exaggerating, and
| possibly lying, about the utility of this mission.
| shash wrote:
| They've changed it so III isn't landing. That will be IV
| apparently.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _there seems to be very little planned on how we
| actually get to the moon base_
|
| There is a lot of research going into _in situ_
| construction methods and even nuclear power plants on the
| moon [1]. (Which would be necessary to bootstrap eventual
| indigenous panel production [2].)
|
| To me it's encouraging to see this fundamental work being
| attacked than an endless sea of renderings. The reason
| you aren't seeing heavy detailing, despite construction
| slated to begin with Artemis V, is we're waiting for the
| launch vehicles. ("Any exploration program which "just
| happens" to include a new launch vehicle is, de facto, a
| launch vehicle program" [3].)
|
| [1] https://www.nasa.gov/news-release/nasa-department-of-
| energy-...
|
| [2] https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-00971-x
|
| [3] https://blog.matt-rickard.com/p/akins-laws-of-
| spacecraft-des...
| runarberg wrote:
| > This effort ensures the United States leads the world
| in space exploration and commerce.
|
| > _"History shows that when American science and
| innovation come together, from the Manhattan Project to
| the Apollo Mission, our nation leads the world to reach
| new frontiers once thought impossible,"_
|
| > Under President Trump's national space policy
|
| I smell politics and American exceptionalism, not
| science. There are a lot of could-bes in these statements
| as well, I have serious suspicions that these goals are
| not serious engineering. I am 99.999% certain that NASA
| will not build a nuclear reactor on the moon this decade,
| nor even the next decade. NASA is not giving me any
| signals they are capable of that.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _I am 99.999% certain that NASA will not build a
| nuclear reactor on the moon this decade, nor even the
| next decade. NASA is not giving me any signals they are
| capable of that_
|
| You don't think NASA and the DOE, together with Lockheed
| and Westinghouse, can build a reactor? Why? The major
| technical issues were largely de-risked with the 2022
| solicitation.
| Rebelgecko wrote:
| Each Artemis launch costs something like $4b (that's the
| incremental cost of a new rocket, it's much higher if you
| amortize the design costs).
|
| IMO the program is not optimized for cost or
| sustainability, it's optimized for creating jobs in
| various congressional districts. Of course that provides
| a certain amount of _political_ sustainability to the so-
| called Senate Launch System.
|
| I just don't see a future where NASA can afford multiple
| SLS launches per year to maintain a continuous Lunar
| presence
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Each Artemis launch costs something like $4b_
|
| Early launches, yes, because SLS is a garbage heap. Later
| ones, almost certainly not.
| sixothree wrote:
| I feel like these missions are just paving the way for
| billionaires to have a new vacation spot.
| palata wrote:
| The difference being that sports are not exclusively paid
| by taxes, I guess?
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _difference being that sports are not exclusively paid
| by taxes_
|
| Space isn't financed "exclusively" by taxes, either.
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| In the USA tax payers pay for most stadiums/arenas.
| hatmanstack wrote:
| Think of all that cheese.
| floxy wrote:
| I want humanity to continue to be explorers. The Moon is a
| good next thing, then asteroid mining, humans on Mars and
| Venus, and eventually colonizing the Milky Way.
| _moof wrote:
| Go take a look at how much this costs compared to the rest of
| the federal budget. I think you'll be surprised by how little
| money NASA gets.
|
| Now, the military...
| Rebelgecko wrote:
| NASA is something like the third biggest space program in
| the US
| LogicFailsMe wrote:
| Because inevitably the Earth will have yet another ELE. And
| it's a better use of tax dollars than warmongering, YMMV.
| anon291 wrote:
| Because it is good for humans to have a thing to do. Not sure
| why this is not considered a valid reason. A lot of these 'it
| would be better to do X' assumes everyone has the same
| psychological profile as you. They don't. Many people are
| driven to explore and would go mad otherwise.
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| I do much better with things to look forward to, or when I
| have a feeling that progress can be made. An interesting
| movie coming out, new music coming out. Or even better
| reminding me what humans are capable of above just grinding
| to get by or grinding to exploit others. Haven't been many
| moments of feeling progress lately.
| hypeatei wrote:
| It's quite telling that all the replies you're getting are
| about "hope" and "jobs" with no actual scientific reason. I
| guess we're taxing people for vanity space missions and jobs
| programs. Makes sense.
| openasocket wrote:
| This argument comes up a lot, about whether a space program
| is "worth it" in some sense. One problem I've found is that
| these discussions often treat this in the abstract. And then
| we get into the nature of human endeavor, the economic
| benefits of that R&D, etc.
|
| Let's talk about this in terms of practicalities. The NASA
| budget for 2026, per Wikipedia, is $24.4B. I often find it
| hard to really reason about the size of federal budgets, and
| the impact on tax payers, but I have a thought experiment
| that I think helps put it into perspective. Suppose we
| decided to pay for the NASA budget with a new tax, just for
| funding NASA. And we did that in the simplest (and most
| unfair) possible way: a flat rate. Every working adult in the
| US has to pay some fixed monthly rate (so excluding children
| and retirees). Again, per Wikipedia, that's around 170M
| people. Take the NASA budget, divide by 170M, and you get ...
| $11.96/month.
|
| Obviously, there's lots of flaws in this. That's not we pay
| for NASA, we have income tax as a percentage with different
| tax brackets. But it is a helpful way to frame how much a
| country is spending, normalized by population. And I think it
| puts a lot of things in perspective. $11.96/month is
| comparable to a streaming service. And we talk a lot about
| whether NASAs budget is better used for other purposes, but
| we don't do the same thing for a streaming service.
|
| Hell, look at US consumer spending:
| https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cesan.nr0.htm (note that
| that spending is in dollars per "consumer unit," which is I
| think is equivalent to an adult US worker, but there might be
| some caveats). Based on that, the average US consumer spends
| around $26.17/month on "tobacco products and smoking
| supplies". I just feel it's a little silly to worry about the
| NASA budget when the US consumer spends twice that on what is
| objectively a luxury good. At least NASA won't give you
| cancer.
| TheOtherHobbes wrote:
| NASA isn't expensive. The science parts and the job
| creation parts almost certainly return a significant
| economic multiplier. The spend is very good value for
| around 0.5% of the federal budget.
|
| That doesn't mean Moon shots are the best possible use of
| that budget. There are strong arguments for creating more
| space stations first, and then using them as staging for
| other projects.
|
| Mars and the Moon are _ridiculously_ hostile environments.
| Hollywood (and Elon Musk) have sold a fantasy of land-
| unpack-build. There aren 't enough words to describe how
| utterly unrealistic that is.
|
| Current strategy is muddled, because it contains elements
| of patriotic Cold War PR fumes, contractor pork, and more
| than a hint of covert militarisation. Science and
| engineering are buried somewhere in the middle of that.
|
| They could be front and centre, but they're not.
| openasocket wrote:
| That's a very fair point. Frankly I don't know enough
| about the Artemis mission and general path, and would
| like to learn more. I'm certainly open to the argument
| that NASA's budget isn't properly allocated to the right
| priorities. I was responding just to the classic argument
| of "why spend money on NASA when we could be spending on
| ..."
| adrian_b wrote:
| I would like to watch a new Moon landing, but in my
| opinion more useful would be to build a space station
| with artificial gravity.
|
| At some point it may become cheaper to build a spacecraft
| on the Moon and launch it in interplanetary missions than
| to do it from Earth. It might also be useful to build
| some bigger telescopes on the Moon than it is practical
| to launch from Earth, because due to the pollution of the
| sky extraterrestrial telescopes become more and more
| necessary.
|
| Despite the fact that there may be some uses for bases on
| the Moon, it is likely that those bases should be mostly
| automated and humans should stay in such bases only for a
| limited time, much like staying on the ISS. The reason is
| that it is very likely that the gravity of the Moon is
| still too low to avoid health deterioration. According to
| the experiments done on mice in the ISS, two thirds of
| the terrestrial gravity were required to avoid health
| issues and one third of the terrestrial gravity provided
| a partial mitigation.
|
| So even the gravity of Mars is only barely enough to
| avoid the more severe health problems, but not
| sufficient.
|
| For long term missions, there is no real alternative to
| the use of a rotating space station, to ensure adequate
| gravity.
|
| While with underground bases on Moon or on Mars it would
| be much easier to provide radiation protection, there
| remains the problem of insufficient gravity. It may be
| necessary to also build a rotating underground base, at
| least for a part where humans spend most of the time.
| ordu wrote:
| _> My personal perspective is that the resources are better
| used for other purposes, but it 's possible that I just
| haven't encountered some compelling reason yet._
|
| Well, people are often obsessed with rationality, and seek
| reasons to do something, but there is one reason that works
| almost for anything: just because. If we want to go forward,
| we'd better try a lot of things, including those that do not
| look very promising. We don't know the future, the only way
| to uncover it is to try. Did you hear about gradient descent?
| It is an algo for finding local maxima and to do its work it
| needs to calculate partial derivatives to choose where to go
| next. In reality doing things and measuring things are
| sometimes indistinguishable. So society would better try to
| move in all directions at once.
|
| A lot of people believe that to fly to the Moon is a good
| idea. Maybe they believe it due to emotional reasons, but it
| is good enough for me, because it allows to concentrate
| enough resources to do it.
|
| _> the resources are better used for other purposes_
|
| It is much better use for $$$ than the war with Iran. I
| believe that the war have eaten more then Artemis already,
| and... Voltaire said "perfect is an enemy of good". The Moon
| maybe not the perfect way to use resources, but it is good at
| least.
| dylan604 wrote:
| How many days of a war with Iran could be funded with the
| Artemis budget?
| jedberg wrote:
| It encourages kids to study science.
|
| It unites Americans towards a cause.
|
| The engineering advancements have commercial applications.
|
| And at the most basic level, it's a jobs program. Look at how
| many Americans are working because of this.
| trothamel wrote:
| Successful space travel is one of the few big news events
| where nobody has to be unhappy.
|
| Most of the other big news events are ones where people get
| severely hurt, and political ones where one partly loses.
|
| With this, we can look up at the moon, and say "Humanity did
| that."
| postalrat wrote:
| Simply because Earth is too small a place for humanity to
| limit itself to.
| lukan wrote:
| It is great to advance of what is humanly possible. Sending a
| robot? Great! Good data. If it dies, who cares, it does not
| live anyway. All abstract.
|
| But sending a human? That feels more real. If we have the
| power to go alive to the moon, we also have the power to go
| even further. And we lost it, now we are reclaiming it.
|
| And it doesn't matter to me what I think of the US government
| - this is progress for all of humanity. Also the comment
| section on the youtube stream is interesting - lot's of
| different flags are posted, sending good wishes from all
| around the world, low effort comments otherwise of course,
| but largely positive. (Very rare I think)
|
| So, more rockets into space please and less on earth.
| longislandguido wrote:
| You're right. The future of humanity is not in space, but in
| venture-backed smartphone apps.
| gwbas1c wrote:
| Because humans are destined to colonize space, and this is
| just an early step in a journey that will take hundreds or
| thousands of years.
|
| More importantly, challenges like space exploration help
| drive knowledge and our economy; and are critical for
| national prestigue.
|
| (And, most people don't focus on this, space exploration is a
| way for the US to demonstrate its military technology in a
| non-antagonistic way. There's a lot of overlap in space
| exploration technology and miliary technology.)
| unselect5917 wrote:
| It's a better thing to strive for than war.
| dotancohen wrote:
| Hopefully, in a few years we will figure out that hydrogen
| rockets can not reliably launch on time and we'll switch to
| less leaky fuels. Then maybe we won't need to pull 40 year old
| engines out of museums to dump in the ocean.
|
| I'm all for human spaceflight, but the Senate Launch System
| seems the best argument for shutting down human spaceflight
| programs.
| _moof wrote:
| Oh, don't worry, we did figure that out. What we haven't
| figured out yet is how to stop Congress from involving
| themselves in engineering decisions.
| dotancohen wrote:
| Well, we should have figured that out with the STS. That's
| what the STS was for - figuring out what technologies made
| for inexpensive, rapid spaceflight and which technologies
| don't.
|
| Then the senate mandates the new rocket to use specifically
| the most expensive, problematic, least reliable technology.
| Completely designed to fail.
|
| Have such hopes for the Starship.
| risc_taker wrote:
| NASA is risking the Astronauts lives, and could have done the
| mission uncrewed to test what is being tested for the first
| time with humans:
|
| Artemis II is not safe to fly -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47582043
| palata wrote:
| But they need to convince the people that it's worth the
| money, and the people are more excited when humans risk their
| lives, even if it is for nothing.
| hghid wrote:
| Even though you could question the whole Artemis concept, it's
| still extremely exciting watching the countdown with my son. I
| just missed the original Apollo flights and had assumed I would
| never see a moon landing in my lifetime. We may well not have a
| landing for quite some time yet, but it's still cool to see a
| Moon bound rocket standing on the launchpad...
| pjmorris wrote:
| We lived ~60 miles North of the Cape when I was a young boy,
| and watching the Saturn V's go on the way to the moon was a
| forming experience.
| chasd00 wrote:
| I lived in Port Orange FL until i was 12, during night
| launches my dad would take the family to New Smyrna Beach or
| some where a short drive South where we watched the shuttles
| come up over the water somehow. I can't remember the details
| it was a lonnnng time ago haha. I do remember the launches
| sounding like popcorn popping.
|
| I live in Dallas now and will be turning 50 soon, i want to
| catch the next Starship launch live but would have to time it
| perfectly to get time off of work ahead of time.
| largbae wrote:
| You probably watched from the Florida side of the
| intercoastal waterway between the main part of Florida and
| Cape Canaveral. Because of the 3-mile minimum and Patrick
| AFB it is pretty hard to find a good watching place that is
| actually on the cape.
| nobleach wrote:
| 80 miles for me! I was a Space Shuttle era kid though. Saw
| the Challenger disaster during my lunchtime. And then on
| perpetual replay for the rest of the week on WESH/WCPX/WFTV
| most likely. Even still, just knowing we were launching all
| those people into space was awe-inspiring.
| lp0_on_fire wrote:
| It's even more exciting when you realize that the last crewed
| mission beyond Low Earth Orbit was 1972 and each person on that
| spacecraft today are younger than that.
| qingcharles wrote:
| I don't know if it's feasible for you, but if you can, try to
| take your kid to see a live rocket launch. The TV is grossly
| unable to display how awesome these things are in person.
| dylan604 wrote:
| It is one of the things I regret not ever getting to see a
| shuttle launch. The closest I ever got was when I flew over
| Florida while a shuttle was on the pad.
| adolph wrote:
| And a landing! S Padre is great for kids and rockets.
|
| For the more adventurous and/or bilingual the beaches on the
| Mexican side seem to have awesome views too.
| whatever1 wrote:
| The scale really is unfathomable for the human brain.
| ludjer wrote:
| Its going to be a first for me and my son as well. Looking
| forward to tonight to make an even over it.
| markus_zhang wrote:
| Gonna watch with my son if it doesn't get postponed.
| duped wrote:
| This opinion may be unpopular here but it's hard to get excited
| about a colossal waste of taxpayer money after all the damage
| DOGE did. I don't understand how these NASA missions with
| questionable scientific value and obscene budgets get off the
| ground.
|
| I mean I do understand, NASA funding is important to oligarchs.
| But still.
| lp0_on_fire wrote:
| Artemis was already set in stone well before DOGE came about
| and IMO if the federal government is going to set mountains of
| cash on fire I'd rather it be to NASA than half the crap the
| government wastes every year.
| duped wrote:
| My point is that DOGE killed a bunch of government programs
| that help people while saving no money, yet this giant waste
| of money survived. Cancelling Artemis II alone in favor of
| III would save a billion dollars by itself.
| cosmicgadget wrote:
| It was never intended to save money. It was about a crusade
| against remote work, eliminating civil servants who might
| be loyal to the Constitution rather than the president, and
| planting a seed of government dysfunction for later years.
| longislandguido wrote:
| > government programs that help people
|
| Like spending $1.5 million on DEI programs in Serbia? That
| actually happened.
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| I personally find the grind easier when there also big things
| happening. You can't just cook the same, most basic, cheapest
| meal every day for your family and expect them to be happy. Who
| wants to join a club that doesn't do anything interesting? Same
| with society. It sometimes needs to dream, to aspire and
| inspire. To lift peoples head from the toil and look up.
| longislandguido wrote:
| Good idea, we should divert taxpayer money to offshore wind and
| AI-powered food delivery startups instead.
| instagib wrote:
| 4.5hrs to go
| edm0nd wrote:
| 17 minutes to go now!
| jcon321 wrote:
| too windy outside for this to happen imo
| rogerrogerr wrote:
| What is your opinion based on?
| jcon321 wrote:
| walking outside, and the surf report... they cancel all the
| time for less wind shear
| cosmicgadget wrote:
| They should switch out to a quad fin fish, it'll handle the
| chop much better.
| conradfr wrote:
| And yet they didn't.
| blitzar wrote:
| licked my finger and stuck it in the air
| _moof wrote:
| You better run over there and let them know.
| iamkonstantin wrote:
| There is also a stream on ESA Web TV https://watch.esa.int/
| adamsb6 wrote:
| It is a bit chilling to watch these astronaut profiles having
| just read yesterday about the heat shield issues observed on the
| prior mission, and that this will be the first time we can test
| the heat shield in the actual pressures and temperatures that it
| will have to endure.
|
| Godspeed crew of Artemis II.
| willis936 wrote:
| That was the intent of the piece. It is impossible to assess
| the true intent of such a piece when it so blatantly is asking
| for attention.
| propagandist wrote:
| Some people are great at self promotion.
| magicalist wrote:
| > _Some people are great at self promotion._
|
| We're commenting on NASA's live stream that exists to get
| us pumped up about the tens of billions of dollars we
| overpaid for this launch.
|
| I'm probably much more happy than the next guy about
| getting to see a flyby of the moon this week even if I
| really wish we'd gotten here another way, but the
| accusation is a bit funny in this thread in particular.
| blks wrote:
| What's the another way?
| bregma wrote:
| You could just re-use the studio where they faked the
| Apollo 11 landing except it was in 7 WTC which was
| destroyed in a controlled demolition to hide the
| evidence.
| lukan wrote:
| https://xkcd.com/1074/
| hluska wrote:
| Are you actually surprised that a livestream paid for my
| NASA would promote NASA? Geez, that's innocent.
| Betelbuddy wrote:
| This is a NASA cover up:
|
| https://youtu.be/pzZWs7CexYI?t=78
|
| https://youtu.be/Wuao1LgO66w?t=218
| xnx wrote:
| Truly. I'm not sure why anyone needs to be on the rocket at
| all, let alone our best and brightest.
| cogman10 wrote:
| Yeah. Doesn't really make sense. The entire mission could be
| done remotely.
|
| Even with a goal of eventually putting humans on the moon,
| it'd be better to do an automated run, measure everything in
| the cockpit, and put in sandbags and/or something to consume
| O2 to make sure the CO2 scrubbers are working correctly. It's
| maybe cruel, but a few dogs would work fine for that sort of
| thing. A flame would be better, but it's pretty dangerous.
|
| The first mission in decades doesn't need to have humans in
| it.
| dannyfreeman wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artemis_I
| cogman10 wrote:
| Thanks. I should have looked this up before posting.
| areoform wrote:
| Because human beings are remarkably capable, especially the
| best and the brightest. There's a great paper called the
| "dispelling the myth of robotic efficiency."
| https://academic.oup.com/astrogeo/article-
| abstract/53/2/2.22... //
| https://lasp.colorado.edu/mop/files/2019/08/RobotMyth.pdf
|
| Yes, a robot car that drives on its own will be a better
| driver than most humans who text and drive, or have 400ms
| reaction times.
|
| But making a machine that can beat a 110ms reaction time
| human with 2SD+ IQ, and the ability to override the ground
| controllers with human curiosity is much harder. Humans have
| high dexterity, are extremely capable of switching roles
| fast, are surprisingly efficient, and force us to return back
| home.
|
| So in terms of total science return, one Apollo mission did
| more for lunar science and discovery than 53 years of robots
| on the surface and in orbit.
| teraflop wrote:
| How does any of that matter for this mission, which will
| not be landing on the moon?
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _How does any of that matter for this mission_
|
| This is a fair question. The closest answer I can get is
| eyes and ears onboard complement sensors.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| It's also rehearsing/testing/experience gathering for an
| eventual mission that _will_ land people on the Moon
| again. Missions don 't happen in isolation.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Missions don 't happen in isolation_
|
| True. I wasn't thinking about training the ground crews.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Only in the last few minutes, the livestream actually
| covered various goals this mission - explicitly a _test
| mission_ - is meant to achieve. For example, one they
| just mentioned is they 're going to be doing some docking
| maneuvers practice.
|
| This is not just training the current flight crew and
| ground crews, but is also generally testing the entire
| system - including operations and hardware too, with
| feedback important to logistics and component
| manufacturers, etc. With possible exception of Falcon 9
| launches, space missions are still infrequent enough that
| each of them is providing knowledge and experience
| meaningfully relevant to all work in and adjacent to
| space exploration and space industry.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _testing the entire system - including operations and
| hardware too, with feedback important to logistics and
| component manufacturers, etc._
|
| This can be done autonomously. The human training cannot.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Not just yet. Give it a few more years for AI (haha,
| another thing yielding stupid amount of value to
| everyone, that people are totally oblivious of - your
| antibiotics comparison in another subthread kinda applies
| too) - but for now, having actual people with full
| sensory capabilities, able to _look at stuff_ on-site
| (and hear, and smell), is something we can 't fully cover
| with computers and sensors. We can recover that and more
| data later, but it's a delayed, after-the-fact analysis.
| There's value in immediate feedback and immediate
| decisions.
| tekla wrote:
| To test the stuff that will allow to land humans on the
| moon
| areoform wrote:
| Because many small steps are required before every giant
| leap.
|
| I would like to point out that the current misadventure
| in the ME has cost at least $38,035,856,006 in 32 days.
| And that won't receive half of the "this is a waste of
| money" critiques this mission will. And there are a ton
| of people who are against that excursion.
|
| Most people who will come across this will react with
| either extreme negativity or indifference. Very few
| people will react positively. This thread itself is
| evidence of that. This is a nerdy community filled with
| people who are deeply positive about space exploration
| and excluding my comments, the straw poll was,
| ~81 positive (48%), ~43 negative (25%), ~45 neutral
| (27%).
|
| Only a plurality of comments were positive. 88 comments
| were neutral or negative.
| dekhn wrote:
| Are you referring to
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troctolite_76535 (https://en.
| wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrison_Schmitt#NASA_career)?
| areoform wrote:
| Yes, and more! > Apollo was over three
| orders of magnitude more efficient in producing
| scientific papers per day of fieldwork than are the MERs.
| This is essentially the same as Squyres' (2005) intuitive
| estimate given above, and is consistent with the more
| quantitative analogue fieldwork tests reported by Snook
| et al. (2007).
|
| Scientific papers are a pretty poor measure of
| productivity so here's another one. We know about the
| existence of He-3 thanks to samples brought back from
| astronauts on the moon. Astronauts setup fiddly UV
| telescope experiments on the moon, trying to set up a
| gravimeter to measure gravitational waves, digging into
| the soil to put explosive charges at different ranges for
| seismic measurement of the moon's subsurface... They were
| extremely productive. Most of what we know about the moon
| happened thanks to the 12 days spent on the lunar
| surface.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far_Ultraviolet_Camera/Spec
| tro...
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_Surface_Gravimeter
| techteach00 wrote:
| Because they want to be on the rocket. To see the moon up
| close with your own eyes? It's spiritual.
| palata wrote:
| I understand why _they_ want to fly. I don 't understand
| why the people is fine paying taxes for that.
| anon291 wrote:
| Independent of how scientifically awesome this is, this
| is probably the most cost effective long term propaganda.
| Why waste money on posters when you can orbit the moon.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Some are.
|
| Money being fungible and all, the rest can pretend their
| tax money is going exclusively to their favorite
| programs, whether that's healthcare or environment or
| building roads or starting wars or funding more startups
| or whatever.
| hn_acc1 wrote:
| The space program has created some great technology we
| use every day now.
| discardable_dan wrote:
| Bro, of all the stupid shit we spend taxes on ($50
| billion on corn subsidies), you're mad about space
| exploration?
| sandworm101 wrote:
| It is a test of the spacecraft. They need people onboard to
| test all the human systems. But yes, if this was a purely
| scientific flyby and not part of a larger manned program,
| machines would do it fine.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| It'll probably turn out fine (in the same way that you'll
| probably survive one round of Russian roulette.) I am quite
| nervous about this though.
| hypeatei wrote:
| > in the same way that you'll probably survive one round of
| Russian roulette
|
| Is that with or without spinning the chamber between rounds?
| The odds are worse if you spin each time. They get worse as
| the game goes on if you don't spin.
| zorobo wrote:
| > The odds are worse if you spin each time.
|
| How do they get worse if you spin? It's still 1/6 odds of
| dying,iid events.
| lukan wrote:
| Erm no. If it goes a round and gets passed without
| spinning, the chances change of course. It is 1/6, 1/5,
| 1/4, 1/3, 1/2, .. 1
| mikkupikku wrote:
| I didn't think of the gun getting passed around. To me,
| "one round" is pulling the trigger once after spinning
| the cylinder with one bullet. 1-in-6 chance of dying,
| you'll probably live. That's how I feel about this
| mission, I think they'll probably live, but man I'm
| nervous.
| cosmicgadget wrote:
| ... 1/0
| hypeatei wrote:
| It's 6/11 _overall_ chance of dying if spinning, no?
|
| From a quick search, this page explains it:
| https://mathworld.wolfram.com/RussianRoulette.html
| Teever wrote:
| Dude, it's a nerd-snipe conversation derailing attempt.
| Don't take the bait.
|
| Talk about space stuff here, not the statistical nature
| of Russian roulette.
| pc86 wrote:
| How about don't tell other people what they can and can't
| talk about, and just ignore side threads you don't care
| about?
|
| There are about 500 different HN browser extensions that
| let you collapse threads, btw.
| encrypted_bird wrote:
| Not parent, but I am genuinely curious: is there a Hacker
| News browser extension you'd recommend? The text is so
| small by default that even though I'd like to read on my
| desktop, I typically only browse it via the Hacki android
| app.
| dguest wrote:
| Get nervous in 10 days, they won't need a heat shield until
| reentry.
| ge96 wrote:
| 10 days? Hope they brought snacks
|
| Seriously though I hope they're able to get up and walk
| around
|
| I don't know if I could handle that 10 days in that small
| room
| vibe42 wrote:
| They can move around after they switch from launch to
| spaceflight config. Apparently they also have some
| exercise gear for the journey.
| ge96 wrote:
| It is just the capsule though? There's no stage under
| them/another cylinder? Module
|
| Trying to imagine how big the thing is like 10x10 feet
| room
| NetMageSCW wrote:
| Just the capsule - there is a module but it can't be
| reached and is for more engines that they will leave
| behind.
| robotnikman wrote:
| Seems like its at least bigger than the Apollo Lunar
| Module from the 70's
|
| And with modern forms of entertainment to make the trip
| less boring.
| ck2 wrote:
| I had to watch "go at throttle up" on replay on the news in
| 1986 for the entire year, like almost every newscast
|
| I was only a teenager and it burned into my brain badly
|
| To this day cannot watch any launch with people onboard live
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| The event itself was a few years before my time, but after
| reading about it and eventually watching the historical news
| footage, the phrase "go at throttle up" also seared itself
| into my brain, and ever since I flinch when I hear it.
| russdill wrote:
| I mean, that's how these heat shields work. They aren't
| reusable, you can't test them and then use them again. Or do
| you mean the design? We already did Artemis I.
| 4khilles wrote:
| The heat shield is a bit different, and the reentry profile
| is a bit different as well.
| russdill wrote:
| I suppose "this will be the first time we can test this
| slightly modified heat shield in the slightly different
| pressures and temperatures that it will have to endure."
| isn't quite as eye catching.
| groby_b wrote:
| I mean, sure. But that's like equipping a sub with a
| screen door and claiming that in the grand scheme of
| things, it's a slightly different door with slightly
| different permeability characteristics.
| andrewflnr wrote:
| Yeah, that's what "untested" means in spaceflight.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _that 's what "untested" means in spaceflight_
|
| Sort of. At a certain threshold, everything is untested.
| I'd put this closer to modified than untested--the
| general config was tested in Artemis I and the specific
| configuration in a variety of ground tests.
| wat10000 wrote:
| We already did Artemis I and the heat shield lost a lot more
| material than it was supposed to on that flight.
| "Specifically, portions of the char layer wore away
| differently than NASA engineers predicted, cracking and
| breaking off the spacecraft in fragments that created a trail
| of debris rather than melting away as designed. The
| unexpected behavior of the Avcoat creates a risk that the
| heat shield may not sufficiently protect the capsule's
| systems and crew from the extreme heat of reentry on future
| missions."
|
| Fixes have been made to the design, but they haven't been
| tested in flight.
| NetMageSCW wrote:
| Also the fixes weren't made on this capsule, since it was
| already built with the old design.
|
| So that means this capsule will fly a different re-entry
| profile to attempt to avoid the issue and Artemis IV will
| fly with untested fixes for lunar return.
| adamsb6 wrote:
| I mean the design.
|
| They've changed the AVCOAT to be less permeable and altered
| the re-entry profile.
|
| One of the findings of Artemis I is that lack of permeability
| led to trapped gas pockets which expanded and blew out pieces
| of heat shield. The reason for the change to be less
| permeable is to make it easier to perform ultrasonic testing,
| not to improve performance.
|
| They altered the re-entry profile on the theory that the skip
| period contributed to spalling, but Charles Camarda disagrees
| in this doc: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ddi792xdfNXc
| BwF8qpDUxmZz...
|
| > Another chart which the Artemis Tiger Team did not intend
| to show on Jan. 8th, was the figure showing the spallation
| events as a function of time during the skip entry heating
| profiles (Figure 6.0-4 of NESC Report TI-23-0189 Vol. 1). In
| this figure, it was quite clear that the Program narrative
| they were feeding to the press, that it was the dwell time
| during the skip which allowed the gases generated to build up
| and cause the delta pressures which caused most of the
| spallation was, again, patently false. In fact, during the
| first heat pulse (t [?] 0 to 240 sec), approximately 40-45%
| of all the medium to large chunks of ablator spalled off the
| Artemis I heatshield.
|
| > Hence, varying the trajectory would do little to prevent
| spallation during Artemis II. I was never shown the new,
| modified trajectory at the Jan. 8th meeting.
| palata wrote:
| See this recent blog post about it (I am not the author): htt
| ps://idlewords.com/2026/03/artemis_ii_is_not_safe_to_fly....
|
| It says that it is not safe to fly. They are sending humans
| without having tested in real conditions that their design
| was sound, _GIVEN_ that the first time they did that (without
| humans), it turned out that their design was unsafe.
| russdill wrote:
| An article written by a "Polish-American web developer,
| entrepreneur, speaker, and social critic" says it's not
| safe to fly. And? What do the astronauts flying on board
| with significantly more information say?
| glenstein wrote:
| Did you read it? They're prolific here and the essence of
| the post is a bunch of citations and quotes from Nasa's
| own staff and literature.
| russdill wrote:
| Yes, I've also read material _outside_ of that article
| from NASA 's own staff and literature.
|
| Statements like this:
|
| "Put more simply, NASA is going to fly Artemis II based
| on vibes, hoping that whatever happened to the heat
| shield on Artemis I won't get bad enough to harm the crew
| on Artemis II."
|
| Are just so intellectually dishonest and completely
| ignore the extensive research and testing that's gone
| into qualifying this flight.
| glenstein wrote:
| So did they! And they showed their work. So far you're
| just beating around the bush.
|
| What would would help is if you said something like
| "Maceij says modeling a different entry approach on
| computers is no substitute for a bona fide re-entry
| testing a new design, but that's incorrect because
| _____."
| russdill wrote:
| I would, except all Maceij is providing is "vibes" and
| much of the official report is redacted.
| gus_massa wrote:
| There is also an old article written by a professional
| bongo player about the Challenger explossion. He has
| other hobbies, but he was not a Rocket Scientist
| https://www.nasa.gov/history/rogersrep/v2appf.htm
|
| The takeaway, is that the software was fine, but other
| systems like the main engine used too much cutting edge
| technology and have a lot of unexpected failure modes and
| too many problems like partialy broken parts that should
| no get partialy broken. [For a weird coincidence, Artemis
| II uses the same engines.] He concluded that when you
| consider all the possible problems the failure rate was
| closer to 1/100, but management was underestimating them
| and the official value that was 1/100000. [Anyway, the
| engines didn't fail in Columbia, it was one of the other
| possible problems.]
|
| The articles explain that the shield has problems but
| management is underestimating them again. Let's hope the
| mission goes fine, but in case of a explosion it would be
| like a deja vu.
| amykhar wrote:
| Fingers crossed that this
| https://idlewords.com/2026/03/artemis_ii_is_not_safe_to_fly....
| doesn't have any effect.
| proee wrote:
| There is a LOC (Loss of Crew) number that is typically
| calculated for these missions. I'm curious what that is? Early
| Apollo missions were on the order of 4%.
| malfist wrote:
| The official minimum standard is 1:270
| baggy_trough wrote:
| Hilarious!
| WalterBright wrote:
| After the moon landing, Armstrong allowed that he had
| estimated the survivability at 50%.
| WalterBright wrote:
| Before the Apollo launch, von Braun was asked what the
| reliability of the rocket was. He asked 6 of his lieutenants
| if it was ready to fly. Each replied "nein". Von Braun
| reported that it had six nines of reliability.
| jedberg wrote:
| I'm assuming this is fake but it's hilarious.
| lukan wrote:
| Is that a real fact?
| WalterBright wrote:
| (I misremembered it slightly, so sue me)
|
| From "Apollo The Race to the Moon" pg 102:
|
| The joke that made the rounds of NASA was that the Saturn
| V had a reliability rating of .9999. In the story, a
| group from headquarters goes down to Marshall and asks
| Wernher von Braun how reliable the Saturn is going to be.
| Von Braun turns to four of his lieutenants and asks, "Is
| there any reason why it won't work?" to which they
| answer: "Nein." "Nein." "Nein." "Nein." Von Braun then
| says to the men from headquarters, "Gentlemen, I have a
| reliability of four nines."
| nasretdinov wrote:
| Reliability of 4 neins to be precise
| cosmicgadget wrote:
| You know why you chose 6 9s.
| kakacik wrote:
| The date checks
| ivanjermakov wrote:
| GitHub taking notes
| kqr wrote:
| In 2014 an independent safety panel estimated 1:75, but I
| think it's slightly better now. The shuttle program
| officially had a limit of 1:90 but in practice achieved 1:67.
| wat10000 wrote:
| In the early days of the Shuttle program, the probability
| was supposedly estimated as low as 1:100,000. Challenger
| brought on a more realistic approach.
| glimshe wrote:
| I'm just SO HAPPY we can talk about something that doesn't
| involve the Iran war, ICE etc. This is a really historic moment,
| I hope that the current and future administrations continue
| investing in space exploration. I've waited my whole life for
| this as the entire "action" happened before I was born.
| Hubble/James Webb/ISS are cool but Artemis is something else!
| floxy wrote:
| >we can talk about something that doesn't involve the Iran war,
| ICE etc.
|
| And yet, you did bring them up.
| cosmicgadget wrote:
| ... federalized voting, birthright citizenship... it is amazing
| how space exploration can be a unifying moment of positivity.
| jeffrallen wrote:
| Really hoping those of us who think NASA has jumped the shark
| won't have to keep ourselves from saying "I told you so" next
| week out of respect for the dead.
|
| This is four people putting their lives at risk for poor
| engineering and bad project management.
|
| The "right stuff" applies to the engineers too, but they've all
| unfortunately left Boeing and NASA.
| 1970-01-01 wrote:
| You're supposed to have peanuts, not popcorn, tonight:
|
| https://science.nasa.gov/missions/what-are-jpls-lucky-peanut...
| ReptileMan wrote:
| Safe trip to the crew. I do hope that they have ironed out all
| the issues.
| zimpenfish wrote:
| Found a stream on YouTube earlier (which presumably wasn't an
| official one because it disappeared 15 minutes later after a
| claim by "FUBO TV") and it had a poll attached: "Will the Artemis
| astronauts land on the moon?"
|
| 40% of people had voted yes. Which is somewhat worrying given the
| mission plan and hardware.
| malfist wrote:
| If these astronauts land on the moon, something has gone
| seriously, seriously wrong.
| RealityVoid wrote:
| Maybe they'll just stop for some pictures on the way back. I
| mean, it's a shame to go all that way and not at least get a
| cool selfie!
| kqr wrote:
| Is there any website that gives me updates mirroring the
| livestream but in plain text? I won't be able to tune in for the
| launch but this is exciting and I'd like to follow the
| developments! I'm sure the answer is "Twitter" but I don't
| understand how that platform works.
| dima55 wrote:
| https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/c4g4ygw0r02t
| floxy wrote:
| https://www.nasa.gov/blogs/missions/2026/04/01/live-artemis-...
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47601017
| dryarzeg wrote:
| Oh hell... Thanks for this reminder, I have almost forgot about
| it with all the problems I'm trying to solve now.
| coldcity_again wrote:
| I'm watching it rapt, but also wondering which KIND of leaky will
| result in a scrub..
| coldcity_again wrote:
| Can't understand why there doesn't seem to be much wider
| excitement at all, around "our Apollo 8", that I've been
| waiting decades for (late 40s here).
|
| Apparently here in the UK our schools are hardly even hyping
| it.
| melonpan7 wrote:
| Wish them all the best and safe travels. I'll be tuning in as you
| never know when the next crewed mission will be, probably not
| another 50 years if advancements in space travel happen.
| mathieu4v wrote:
| I will be watching the launch from Europe, so it will be not
| earlier than half past midnight for us. My kids (9 and 10) are
| sleeping on the couch in front of the projection screen, so that
| they do not even have to get up when I wake them up at midnight,
| which I promised.
|
| Just wanted to add my grain of positivity here. Godspeed Artemis
| 2!
| heresie-dabord wrote:
| > add my grain of positivity
|
| The best of science, reason, research, engineering, training,
| expertise, co-operation...
|
| The best of humanity. _Le meilleur de l 'humanite._
| ginkgotree wrote:
| From here on the space coast of Florida: GODSPEED THE CREW OF
| ARTEMIS II
| longislandguido wrote:
| I find it interesting the MSM is too busy sperging out about
| Trump to not treat this as page-three news and place it below the
| cut.
|
| It's also the first woman and black guy to go to the moon, for
| those keeping score at home.
| fny wrote:
| Trump scored an own goal. Military conflict tends to hijack the
| front page.
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| Why do this? Why look to space and understand Earth's smallness?
| So we can understand reality as Carl Sagan explains in his pale
| blue dot speech.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wupToqz1e2g
| areoform wrote:
| There are tons of comments here that say, "this could have been a
| robot." And no, it really couldn't have.
|
| The best of humanity is remarkably capable as compared to the
| best physical machines / robots. There's a great paper called the
| "dispelling the myth of robotic efficiency."
| https://academic.oup.com/astrogeo/article-abstract/53/2/2.22...
| // https://lasp.colorado.edu/mop/files/2019/08/RobotMyth.pdf
| > "the expert evidence we have heard strongly suggests that the
| use of autonomous robots alone will very significantly limit what
| can be learned about our nearest potentially habitable planet"
| (Close et al. (2005; paragraph 70). > > Putting
| it more bluntly, Steve Squyres, the Principal Investigator for
| the Mars Exploration Rovers Spirit and Opportunity, has written:
| > > "[t]he unfortunate truth is that most things our
| rovers can do in a perfect sol [i.e. a martian day] a human
| explorer could do in less than a minute" (Squyres, 2005, pp.
| 234-5).
|
| Yes, a robot car that drives on its own will be a better driver
| than most humans who text and drive, or have 400ms reaction
| times.
|
| But making a machine that can beat a 110ms reaction time human
| with 2SD+ IQ - and the ability to override the ground controllers
| with human curiosity - for exploration is much harder. Healthy,
| smart humans have high dexterity, are extremely capable of
| switching roles fast, are surprisingly efficient, and force us to
| return back home.
|
| So in terms of total science return, one Apollo mission did more
| for lunar science and discovery than 53 years of robots on the
| surface and in orbit.
| gus_massa wrote:
| They are not going to land on the Moon! They are just going to
| sit in a can for two weeks and take photos. (OK. Tthe can is on
| top of a lot of burning explosive material and if they don't
| aim correctly they will get in a weird trajectory that will
| kill them. Not for the faint of heart.)
|
| I'm not sure if they can override the commands send from Earth,
| but turning on and off the engines like in the Apollo XIII
| movie is like 100 times less accurate than the automatic
| orders. It's not 1969, now computer can play chess and aim to
| go around the Moon better than us.
|
| Also, there is still Artemis III to test the live support
| equipment with humans inside, before Artemis IV that is spouse
| to attempt landing on the Moon.
| dang wrote:
| Recent and related:
|
| _Artemis II is not safe to fly_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47582043 - March 2026 (598
| comments)
| _trampeltier wrote:
| Even I'm a big space fan, at moment I just can enjoy anything
| that comes from USA. I just can't applause to a super bully.
| pc86 wrote:
| What a sad, disappointing instinct. It completely divorced from
| reality to assume that "enjoy[ing] anything that comes from
| [the] USA" implies any sort of political allegiance to whoever
| happens to sit in the Oval office at that particular point in
| time.
|
| There's no way you're "a big space fan" if the first thing you
| think of when you see a rocket launch that was announced 9
| years is Donald Trump.
| boringg wrote:
| That's your own thing. Think about it to applause the dedicated
| work of people who have spent their life building these
| missions and have to do this work through multiple different
| administrations.
| chinathrow wrote:
| Range is go after they worked to verify the FTS. Great news.
| vibe42 wrote:
| Mild Space Weather: https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/
|
| Moderate geomagnetic storm watch until April 2.
| jgord wrote:
| Regardless of whether this particular mission is perfectly
| planned, this is precisely the kind of thing that will help
| humanity outgrow the dark age of war, inequality and climate
| mismanagement.
|
| It is a noble endeavor - science, engineering and peaceful
| exploration hold the keys to our survival and prosperity.
|
| It is also important psychologically to our survival - a reminder
| there is a bigger pie, that we can solve hard problems, that
| progress can be made, that competence and education counts, as
| does courage, and that we can work together for a common cause.
|
| This is the best of America, and for a while we can be proud of
| the human race.
| lapcat wrote:
| > this is precisely the kind of thing that will help humanity
| outgrow the dark age of war, inequality and climate
| mismanagement.
|
| How do you figure? The previous Moon missions certainly didn't
| accomplish that.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| You don't solve these problems in a single step, but notice
| how space imagery and analogies pop up every time people try
| to talk about peace, global problems, mutual empathy,
| understanding, etc. The Pale Blue Dot, images of Earth from
| orbit or the Moon, etc. Those are anchors in public
| consciousness, competing in memetic space with usual
| divisive, dystopian, hope-draining pictures and soundbites -
| we need more of them to improve on the big problems, and we
| absolutely would not have them if not for people actually
| flying to space.
|
| Or, put differently, space exploration is one of the few
| things "feeding the right wolf" for humanity at large.
| lapcat wrote:
| > You don't solve these problems in a single step
|
| Obviously, but there's no evidence that the previous Moon
| missions were a step toward solving the problems.
|
| > notice how space imagery and analogies pop up every time
| people try to talk about peace, global problems, mutual
| empathy, understanding, etc.
|
| You think these problems will be solved with... photos?
|
| How many more photos do we need? Everyone has seen the
| photos already. I'm sure Putin and Trump have seen the
| photos of Earth.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Nobody it'll say space exploration will alone solve those
| problems. But it helps, and can help more - much more, if
| we go all the way in and establish permanent economic
| activity and eventually settlements in the space near
| Earth and beyond.
| lapcat wrote:
| > if we go all the way in and establish permanent
| economic activity and eventually settlements in the space
| near Earth and beyond.
|
| Could you please explain exactly how these would help to
| stop war and inequality?
|
| As far as I can tell, space exploration is going to
| exacerbate inequality, for example, by making Elon Musk
| even more obscenely wealthy than he already is.
| rhubarbtree wrote:
| Sparked the environmental movement, to name but one major
| impact.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Also wrt. "climate mismanagement", pretty much all tools we
| get to measure climate exist because of space program, and
| many require it to function.
| 113 wrote:
| Okay well we have those already and it hasn't really
| changed anything.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Disagree about the change. Even the fact that you know
| and care enough to argue this on-line is a change that
| can be attributed to space missions - and it's even more
| true about the overall global conversation about climate
| situation, and all activities taken to help with it.
|
| These things do take time though.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _we have those already and it hasn 't really changed
| anything_
|
| What's the term for antibiotics having been so successful
| that we forget all their benefits?
|
| The Montreal Protocol worked [1]. It probably couldn't
| have without our satellite data.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montreal_Protocol
| lapcat wrote:
| This is absurd. Have you heard of Rachel Carson's 1962
| "Silent Spring"?
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > > The previous Moon missions certainly didn't accomplish
| that.
|
| > Sparked the environmental movement, to name but one major
| impact.
|
| It...really didn't. There was a new wave with a different
| political orientation (less conservative/elite) in the
| environmental movement roughly contemporary to the space
| program from--the 1950s through the 1970s--but it was
| driven by a variety of human driven (nuclear testing, oil
| spills, etc.) environmental disasters combined with more
| modern media coverage that occurred in that time than with
| the space program itself.
|
| I know there are people who try to ignore all that and
| pretend that the whole thing was just the Earthrise photo
| in 1968 but much of the development of the mew character of
| the movement happened before Earthrise, and even what
| happened after generally clearly had other more important
| causes.
| fasterik wrote:
| The key phrase is "kind of thing". It certainly does matter
| what kinds of things we focus our attention on as a species.
| I think you would have to be quite cynical to think that
| progress in spaceflight over the past 60+ years hasn't had a
| positive impact.
| lapcat wrote:
| > I think you would have to be quite cynical to think that
| progress in spaceflight over the past 60+ years hasn't had
| a positive impact.
|
| Spaceflight aside, how exactly has humanity started to
| outgrow war, inequality, and climate mismanagement? Call me
| cynical, but I'm not seeing it.
| oceanplexian wrote:
| Global rates of poverty are 83% lower than they were in 1969
| when we landed on the moon.
|
| So actually, millions of lives have massively benefited from
| science and technology. To be cynical in the face of all that
| is a personal take, not a reflection of the facts.
| rdedev wrote:
| I hope it does. But every day that goes by I feel that the
| future is just going to be like what's shown in the expanse
| series
| api wrote:
| My personal take for a long time has been that the primary
| driver of _most_ war today is boredom. War today is
| undertaken for entertainment. It 's a special kind of
| entertainment that taps into deep brain stem circuits and
| provides a false but deeply resonating sense of purpose and
| meaning. When you hear that "people don't have a sense of
| meaning," it means their brain stem is not feeling the tribal
| loyalty emotions connected to warfare.
|
| It would be cheaper to solve resource shortages in almost any
| other way. I don't really buy that explanation, at least for
| most wars. I think most wars today have roots that are far
| less rational.
|
| Note that this applies IMO to all participants on all sides
| insofar as they had any role in starting or sustaining the
| war.
| trhway wrote:
| The expanse future isn't that bad - even at the start of the
| series we've already made it to the asteroid belt and Jupiter
| moons, and the civilization consists of several sovereign
| self-governed entities with individual entrepreneurship and
| private enterprise allowed. It means we didn't annihilate
| ourself in a nuclear war, nor our civilization collapsed into
| allways-fully-connected ant colony (or one global
| fascist/communist/religious regime).
| evan_ wrote:
| uh I would argue that at the beginning of The Expanse
| things are middling to bad and at the end things are
| _pretty fucking bad_. The epilogue of the final book is the
| only thing that 's unabashedly optimistic.
|
| The main series takes place over about 30 years during
| which several billion people die system-wide as a result of
| various wars, and uncountably many die in the immediate
| aftermath of the finale. I love it but it's not really a
| feel-good story!
| m_fayer wrote:
| Agreed it's a tolerable vision, it could be worse. But it's
| also a vision of humanity mostly living in enormous
| disenfranchised structural underclasses - corporate-
| authoritarianism in the asteroids and subsistence-UBI for
| all those unnecessary humans on Earth.
|
| It's a vision of incredible technological progress without
| any growth in our ability to justly and humanely govern
| ourselves or move past violent conflict.
|
| I agree with GP this is our current trajectory. I'd live in
| that world and hope I'd get lucky, but what a
| disappointment if that's all we can manage.
| wvbdmp wrote:
| I hope so, but if this goes awry in any way, especially if -
| god forbid - they lose the crew, my fear is it'll be a blow to
| the American hegemony that will be very hard to recover from.
| Orange man is bad, but I think something like that would add a
| whole other dimension to the US's loss of face. I'm as anti-
| american as they come, but despite everything Pax Americana
| must be acknowledged and I shudder at the thought of it
| shattering.
|
| Godspeed!
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _if - god forbid - they lose the crew, my fear is it'll be
| a blow to the American hegemony that will be very hard to
| recover from_
|
| This has zero impact on American hegemony. That mission is
| being prosecuted in Iran and with respect to NATO.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Regardless of whether this particular mission is perfectly
| planned, this is precisely the kind of thing that will help
| humanity outgrow the dark age of war, inequality and climate
| mismanagement.
|
| More likely, it is precisely the kind of thing that will be
| managed specifically to keep people distracted, so that the
| people who have a near term benefit from the dark age of war,
| inequality, and climate mismanagement can continue realizing
| that benefit without interruption by people taking action right
| up until there is no one left to distract or benefit.
| yodsanklai wrote:
| > this is precisely the kind of thing that will help humanity
| outgrow the dark age of war, inequality and climate
| mismanagement.
|
| Is that irony or plain naiveness? historically and technically,
| conquest of space is inseparable from warfare. As for climate
| change, one can argue that technology is one of the primary
| driver: aviation alone is estimated to 4% of global temperature
| rise.
| bouncycastle wrote:
| This is a new space race. From a geopolitical level, a nation
| that has a better presence on the moon will have a better
| strategic advantage.
| browningstreet wrote:
| Space Force would disagree.
|
| The talk of taking the Moon would belie.
| sandworm101 wrote:
| KSP irl. I still dont know how they keep the framerate so high
| with so many parts.
| LightBug1 wrote:
| Did the CIA do its job correctly and put Trump on that rocket?
| sgt wrote:
| Liftoff! The planning that went behind this is mind boggling.
| Well done
| mrbonner wrote:
| Godspeed AI-I
| nodesocket wrote:
| The SpaceX cameras of live launches are way better. This NASA
| stream is mostly all computer generated art after the initial pad
| launch. Hardly any live space feeds from the ship.
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