this post was submitted on 06 Dec 2025
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Congress warned that NASA’s current plan for Artemis “cannot work” - Ars Technica (arstechnica.com)
submitted 6 days ago by otters_raft@lemmy.ca to c/space@mander.xyz
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In recent months, it has begun dawning on US lawmakers that, absent significant intervention, China will land humans on the Moon before the United States can return there with the Artemis Program.

So far, legislators have yet to take meaningful action on this—a $10 billion infusion into NASA’s budget this summer essentially provided zero funding for efforts needed to land humans on the Moon this decade. But now a subcommittee of the House Committee on Space, Science, and Technology has begun reviewing the space agency’s policy, expressing concerns about Chinese competition in civil spaceflight.

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[–] burble@lemmy.dbzer0.com 10 points 6 days ago (20 children)

Saying it "cannot work" because of orbital refuelling seems pretty disconnect from reality. The ISS has been getting refuelled for decades. Starship has done cryogenic fuel transfer demos. The depot architecture, that SpaceX keeps topped up with random fill-in flights the way they treat Starlink with Falcon 9, seems doable.

Comparing the Chinese lunar program to Apollo misses the point. Antarctica has multiple independent bases getting resupplied and having people move in and out all the time. That's starting to happen in LEO and should be the goal for the Moon and Mars.

[–] Mihies@programming.dev 0 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Lol, Starship has done demos and it seems doable is very hilarious. I bet even people on Mars by 2026 is doable, amirite?

[–] Cocodapuf@lemmy.world 3 points 6 days ago

Yeah, it's not there yet. But soon.

I mean, I wouldn't doubt that it will achieve its goals, it's very close already. If all they wanted was a single use rocket with a reusable booster and greater payload to orbit than the Saturn V at a fraction of the cost, then that has already been achieved, and that is not nothing.

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