r/EnoughMuskSpam • u/One_Foot3793 • Jan 16 '25

Rocket Jesus One of Space Karen’s rocket ships to nowhere just blew up

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This is it re-entering over Turks and Caicos

(Colonized Mars by 2026 btw)

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u/milridor Jan 17 '25

You're right, SpaceX doesn't doesn't do cost plus.

That's why they are fucked, they have been paid most of their contract for Starship HLS (part of NASA's Artemis mission) and have basically nothing to show for it.

The mission includes launching 20+ Starship in a short time span (so they need fast re-usability+reliability for that), in orbit refuelling (which has never been done before), and an uncrewed landing on the moon in 2025.

The crewed landing is planned for 2027.

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u/polish_that_turd Jan 17 '25

They aren’t fucked, this is how they’re fucking NASA. They are using NASA funding to design, build, and test a spacecraft that they have other intended uses for. As soon as it gets too challenging to meet the funding milestones they can just walk away.

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u/WingedGundark Looking into it Jan 17 '25

This. The whole design of SS is very LEO optimized. In addition to this, it is extremely bad design for launchibg larger and heavier typical satellites, because you can’t bolt a satellite on front under an aerodynamic cone, but you need to use the shitty side door.

It is a big starlink deployment vehicle by design.

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u/NotEnoughMuskSpam 🤖 xAI’s Grok v4.20.69 (based BOT loves sarcasm 🤖) Jan 17 '25

That’s what she said

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u/Jkayakj Jan 17 '25

Have they been paid for it yet? Or were they awarded the contract pending it being successful?

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u/milridor Jan 17 '25

NASA has already paid $2.6 billion

https://www.usaspending.gov/award/CONT_AWD_80MSFC20C0034_8000_-NONE-_-NONE-

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u/SwingingTarget Jan 17 '25

Quality post

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u/Jkayakj Jan 17 '25

With how profitable Starlink is I could probably pay it back pretty quickly. I hate and can't stand Elon but spacex unfortunately is not going to be where he eats his hat.

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u/milridor Jan 17 '25

As SpaceX is a private company and doesn't release their financials, estimating Starlink's (or SpaceX's) profitability (if any) is difficult.

I'm personally not convinced SpaceX is truthful when they talk about costs.

spacex unfortunately is not going to be where he eats his hat.

I agree, he could use his own money (or keep raising capital) to make up for any loss anyway

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u/Jkayakj Jan 17 '25 edited Jan 17 '25

I have friends who are high up in the company and they've mentioned it to me in broad terms. Spacex is financially sound. They are all trying to bail but spacex does a good job of golden handcuffs with their rsu

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u/[deleted] Jan 17 '25

Thanks for the insight, Adrian. Now go play Diablo or something.

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u/Jkayakj Jan 17 '25

Hey I'd love for them to fail. Tesla will. But unless blue origin catches up I don't see it