this post was submitted on 19 Jun 2025
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It would be funny if it wasn't sponsored by taxpayers. Every blown up Starship is that many billions just, poof, gone. And yes, I know they do learn a great deal from failures as well, but the Apollo program didn't have nearly as many issues...
Eh, only kinda. NASA have agreed to purchase Starship launch services for the Artemis program, but they aren't funding each test individually.
That's money that SpaceX have to pay though, not NASA. The Starship contract for Artemis is fixed-price, not cost-plus. Whether SpaceX blow up one Starship or ten during the testing phase, NASA pay the same amount for the operational flights.
And starship does not cost several billions each, maybe 1/10 that.
It wouldnt have benefited taxpayers if it had launched, so that makes no sense.
Apollo cost about 300 billion in today's money, and spacex has gotten about 20 billion in contracts so far. Less than 10% of the cost.
Appolo did the job (with the exception of appolo 1). Because they paid the real price of a working program.
Not sure what you're trying to say. Is spacex not doing the job it's supposed to be doing?
What I'm trying to say is that there is a connection between the money invested and the quality of the result. SpaceX starship programs several times cheaper than the NASA Apollo program, but keeps failing. At the end of it, it will probably cost the same for a successful launch.
You realise NASA isn't paying for the development of Starship, yes? If spacex doesn't get it working on budget, it's spacex who's paying for it, not NASA.
The space shuttle disagrees with you.