In 2020, President Trump shouted Elon Musk for the first flight of his company’s astronauts to the ISS.
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smallPacex has been caught in CrossFire of the ongoing controversy between Donald Trump and the founder of Elon Musk. The two men share barbs over the president’s proposed bill, with Musk criticizing it to include excessive spending and increase the deficit. On Thursday afternoon, the President posted In the truth of this social “[t]It is an easier way to save money on our budget, billions and billions of dollars, is to terminate Elon’s government subsidies and contracts. ”
In response, musk tweeted That “in the light of the president’s statement on the cancellation of my government contracts, @spacex will immediately begin the Dragon Space Vessel”. (A few hours later, in AReply to another user xsaid “okay, we won’t decorate the dragon.”)
If Trump was to follow the cancellation of contracts or Elon changes his mind again for Dragon, the highest price can be paid by NASA. Although the space organization played a decisive role in removing the company, SpaceX no longer needs it. According to Musk, the company brings today $ 15.5 billion $ per year in revenue. Tower He estimates that about 80% of this comes from the internet business, Starlink. And while SpaceX still gets a lot of government businesses, it also starts dozens of commercial spacecraft every year.
The reverse, however, is not true. NASA is largely based on SpaceX for its activities – the company’s rockets started over half of the organization’s space missions last year. And while NASA has other partnership partners, many are years behind SpaceX in terms of growth.
The Los Angeles -based Rocket Lab laboratory, for example, launched the second NASA missions last year. But its electrons rocket can only handle small satellites – not the largest spacecraft that usually starts the space body. While this company works in a larger rocket, it is not expected to start until later this year.
SpaceX is also today the only American company that can carry astronauts to the International Space Station, thanks to the Dragon spacecraft. Without it, NASA will be forced to rely again on the Russian Space Service for this project until Boeing is able to obtain its spacecraft certified. This may take a little bit, as on its first flight last June, technical problems ended up competing with its two astronauts in the ISS for months. Neither Boeing nor the organization have provided a timetable for a second mission.
SpaceX makes more of the Ferry crew members to the ISS, also offers most of its load. And while there is an important alternative, Cygnus, operated by Northrop Grumman, has started at SpaceX Rockets, with a third SpaceX flight scheduled for later this year. A third cargo option, developed by Sierra Space, does not make his father’s journey until later this year.
Fallout from Blowup Trump-Musk can also influence NASA’s future designs. SpaceX was a prominent part of the organization’s plan for the Artemis program, which will return astronauts to the moon. In the budget request released this monthThe Trump administration called for the retirement of the organization’s SLS Rocket and Orion after a scheduled third and final mission. They must be replaced by the spacecraft from the blue origin of Jeff Bezos and SpaceX.
The timetable for all this could not be worse for NASA, which is currently without a leader. President Trump had been appointed billionaire Jared Isaacman as a NASA administrator, a move that had attracted bilateral support. But last Friday, the White House Pulled his candidateA few days before it is expected to be confirmed by the Senate.
This may also have contributed to Blowup Trump-Musk. Isaacman’s company, Shift4, is a SpaceX investor and Isaacman himself has entered two separate space flights from the company. In appearance at All-in podcast On Wednesday he suggested that one reason his candidate was pulled may have been his connections to Musk. “There were some people with some axes to grind,” he said. “And I was visible target.”
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