“Senator, what was your government doing instead of beating China to the moon?”
“We were busy kicking out immigrants, scientists, and the gays while cracking down on gender flexibility in kids’ sports.”
We’ve known for years that China would be back on the Moon before the US. When NASA decided to go with spacex solution of sending 20 rockets to get 2-3 people up there, that’s when we knew China had already won.
Somehow the insane SpaceX lander was the best option, which says a lot about their competitors.
As opposed to Blue Origin’s solution, which was to be assembled from three different spacecraft in orbit? Or the Dynetics solution, which was over its own mass budget?
It’s wild that the crazy overbuilt and overcomplicated SpaceX lander is the best option.
The Blue Origin lander, which won the 2nd place consolation contract, changed to be more like Starship than their original 3-part proposal. They also rely on orbital refueling now.
I wish Dynetics could have made their mass margins work. I liked the size and shape of that lander.
When NASA decided to go with spacex solution
No, I think it was before that, when NASA decided to reuse Space Shuttle hardware to build an expendable launch vehicle with lower performance than the Saturn V, and no utility beyond the Artemis program.
Along with every other practical yardstick for measuring human progress. Hygiene too!