Jun 27, 2024 07:57 AM
(This post was last modified: Jun 27, 2024 08:05 AM by Yazata.)
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European Space Agency director of space transportation Toni Tolker-Nielsen:
"I don’t think Starship will be a game-changer or a real competitor."
"We made the choice of not being reusable with Ariane 6" because "our launch needs are so low that it wouldn’t make sense economically."
https://x.com/thesheetztweetz/status/180...0903788002
Eric Berger (to steal CC's memorable phrase) overturns the Scorn Bucket on the European Space Agency's head:
(What Eric describes is the difference between visionary leadership and bureaucratic leadership.)
"There was a panel discussion at a space conference in Singapore 11 years ago that has since become legendary in certain corners of the space industry for what it reveals about European attitudes toward upstart SpaceX...
At one point during the discussion, the host asked the Arianespace representative—its chief of sales in Southeast Asia, Richard Bowles—how the institutional European company would respond to SpaceX's promise of lower launch costs and reuse with the Falcon 9 rocket...
"What I'm discovering in the market is that SpaceX primarily seems to be selling a dream, which is good. We should all dream," Bowles replied. "I think a $5 million launch or a $15 million launch is a bit of a dream. Personally, I think reusability is a dream. How am I going to respond to a dream? My answer to respond to a dream is, first of all, you don't wake people up."...
Later in the discussion, Bowles added that he did not believe launching 100 times a year, something that SpaceX was starting to talk about, was "realistic." Then, in a moment of high paternalism, he turned to the SpaceX official on the panel and said, "You shouldn't present things that are not realistic."...
Eleven years later, of course, SpaceX is launching more than 100 times a year. The company's internal price for launching a Falcon 9 is significantly less than $20 million. And all of this is possible through the reuse of the rocket's first stage and payload fairings, each of which have now proven capable of flying 20 or more times.
One might think that, in the decade since, European launch officials would have learned their lesson...
And what about Starship?...
"Honestly, I don’t think Starship will be a game-changer or a real competitor," he [Tolker-Nielsen] said in an interview with Space News...
...to say Starship will not be a game-changer represents the same head-in-the-sand attitude displayed by Bowles a decade ago with his jokes about not waking the deluded dreamers up. In hindsight, it's clear that the dreamers were not SpaceX or its customers. Rather, they were European officials...
That lack of visionary leadership is why more than 60 years after Yuri Gagarin, Europe still has no human spaceflight capability, and no real plans that I'm aware of to acquire one. Even India is just a year or two away from surpassing Europe.
https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/06/so...-the-sand/
nsNS
European Space Agency director of space transportation Toni Tolker-Nielsen:
"I don’t think Starship will be a game-changer or a real competitor."
"We made the choice of not being reusable with Ariane 6" because "our launch needs are so low that it wouldn’t make sense economically."
https://x.com/thesheetztweetz/status/180...0903788002
Eric Berger (to steal CC's memorable phrase) overturns the Scorn Bucket on the European Space Agency's head:
(What Eric describes is the difference between visionary leadership and bureaucratic leadership.)
"There was a panel discussion at a space conference in Singapore 11 years ago that has since become legendary in certain corners of the space industry for what it reveals about European attitudes toward upstart SpaceX...
At one point during the discussion, the host asked the Arianespace representative—its chief of sales in Southeast Asia, Richard Bowles—how the institutional European company would respond to SpaceX's promise of lower launch costs and reuse with the Falcon 9 rocket...
"What I'm discovering in the market is that SpaceX primarily seems to be selling a dream, which is good. We should all dream," Bowles replied. "I think a $5 million launch or a $15 million launch is a bit of a dream. Personally, I think reusability is a dream. How am I going to respond to a dream? My answer to respond to a dream is, first of all, you don't wake people up."...
Later in the discussion, Bowles added that he did not believe launching 100 times a year, something that SpaceX was starting to talk about, was "realistic." Then, in a moment of high paternalism, he turned to the SpaceX official on the panel and said, "You shouldn't present things that are not realistic."...
Eleven years later, of course, SpaceX is launching more than 100 times a year. The company's internal price for launching a Falcon 9 is significantly less than $20 million. And all of this is possible through the reuse of the rocket's first stage and payload fairings, each of which have now proven capable of flying 20 or more times.
One might think that, in the decade since, European launch officials would have learned their lesson...
And what about Starship?...
"Honestly, I don’t think Starship will be a game-changer or a real competitor," he [Tolker-Nielsen] said in an interview with Space News...
...to say Starship will not be a game-changer represents the same head-in-the-sand attitude displayed by Bowles a decade ago with his jokes about not waking the deluded dreamers up. In hindsight, it's clear that the dreamers were not SpaceX or its customers. Rather, they were European officials...
That lack of visionary leadership is why more than 60 years after Yuri Gagarin, Europe still has no human spaceflight capability, and no real plans that I'm aware of to acquire one. Even India is just a year or two away from surpassing Europe.
https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/06/so...-the-sand/
nsNS
![[Image: GtocDVFWoAAZNZk?format=jpg&name=medium]](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GtocDVFWoAAZNZk?format=jpg&name=medium)