SpaceX Wins Use of NASA's Launch Pad 39A

SpaceX and NASA have reached an agreement (though negotiations on the details are ongoing) for the private space company to lease NASA's launch pad 39A. SpaceX rival Blue Origin had also sought the launch pad for its own use. From the article: "During the selection process, Blue Origin had filed a petition to the Government Accountability Office (GAO). The spaceflight company was claiming that NASA was favoring single-use of the launch pad which was designed as a multi-user facility. ... The GAO decided on Thursday that the petition has no basis, which prompted NASA to proceed with its decision process. The next day, the space agency informed both companies that it is granting the exclusive lease to SpaceX."

Re:When would Space-X launch a moon expedition ?

[Frosty Piss]

China has just landed their space craft on the moon. Just hours ago.

When will Space-X do that ?

SpaceX is a commercial "lift" company. Their objective would include landing something on the moon only if someone paid them to do it.

SpaceX is challenging Lockheed Martin and Boeing's United Launch Alliance [wikipedia.org]

Seeing as I've never heard of "Blue Origin"

[msobkow]

I've never heard of "Blue Origin" before. As such, I'm guessing they haven't successfully launched shit.

Space-X can actually use the pad now.

Re:Good

[Frosty Piss]

That should not be for NASA to decide. Instead of having a "selection process", they should simply hold an auction. The launch pad should be rented to the highest bidder.

Bullshit.

The launch pad should be rented to the company that has the most potential to actually use it for something useful like launching rockets.

It's not a hotel room or a luxury car, it's a piece of valuable high technology. It's not a toy for rent.

Re:Good

[TWX]

Indeed, SpaceX has demonstrated that first, that they can achieve objectives in space, and second, that their tech has some fairly impressive fault-tolerance while still safely fulfilling its mission. There was both an incident of an aborted post-ignition event that didn't damage the vehicle, subsequently allowing technicians to inspect and restart the launch, and a failure with one of the clusters of rockets that was successfully worked-around mid-flight, shutting down the affected engine and boosting the performance on the remaining engines.

Also to the matter of who can rent, GP's argument that anyone should be able to rent it is stupid not only because Blue Origin isn't ready to launch yet, but that the argument could mean that anyone, including those that don't have interest in space launches, could rent it. Mind you, there's a risk that SpaceX could block once other competitors enter the market, but on the other hand, 39B has been reconfigured to be multirole already, and 39C was planned and could still be built, and if serious competitors can demonstrate an ability to launch, SpaceX might lose its exclusivity the next time the contract comes up.

Re: No, not good at all.

[Teancum]

This article is not the only report or for that matter even news agency that has reported on this topic. Blue Origin has indeed zero customers at the moment who want to use their services, and the contract is only for five years anyway before it is up for renegotiation.... at which time Blue Origin can try to put forward something of their own that actually can fly.

Elon Musk was so cocky about the whole thing that he offered at his own expense (or the expense of SpaceX and not NASA) to accommodate Blue Origin or for that matter any other American company that might want to use this launch pad for their own projects (referring also to United Launch Alliance). Furthermore, Mr. Musk speculated that the likelihood of Blue Origin actually qualifying according to FAA-AST standards necessary for human spaceflight (which is the only point of using this launch pad as opposed to other locations that certainly are available including at the Kennedy Space Complex at Florida) in the next five years is about as likely as seeing dancing unicorns in that same flame duct.

I have to agree with Mr. Musk on this point too. It isn't just a matter of Blue Origin spending megabucks to build their own launch facility, of which SpaceX has gone through and built three launch pads besides this one and is shopping around for a fourth launch pad in addition to this launch pad (that one is likely to be in Brownsville, Texas), but that Blue Origin is also not really capable of using this particular facility at all.

The whole point of this legal action is to try and delay any potential launches that SpaceX might do at this particular launch pad. SpaceX needs it for both the Falcon Heavy rocket as well and manned launches in particular. It also can act as a back-up site if SLC-40 (the other Florida pad that SpaceX currently operates) needs to go through a period of renovation.

There are another 38 other potential launch sites in the area that are suitable to various degrees or other for spaceflight activity. Some of them certainly are not really suitable and others are in such utter state of disrepair as to be essentially carving out a new spot in the swampland of Cape Canaveral, but there are other locations if the desire was made. There is also pad 39B, but that is currently being used by NASA for the SLS/Orion program as long as that program continues to get funding.

Re:Watch out

[idji]

There is no significant difference between 80,000 km and 384400 km. It is only 6.9% more energy than getting from the Earth's surface to 80,000 km. - so getting as far as the Moon is trivial for SpaceX - getting into orbit and landing is another issue though.
SpaceX was launching to low earth orbit and got their in a few minutes - last month they got to geosynchronous orbit in just a few more minutes. The Chinese took 12 days to get to the Moon because they weren't in a hurry and wanted to save energy - Apollo needed to get humans there and back faster.
Elon Musk wants to emigrate to Mars. You can be sure that that he will be playing on the Moon before sending stuff and people to Mars.

Re:Good

[FireFury03]

This is why the government cannot make money.

Governments aren't supposed to be about making money - governments are about doing things that are good for the citizens but unviable for a company to do.

If the government thinks that letting SpaceX use the pad is a Good Thing for the public, then that's what they should be doing, irrespective of whether they are going to make money from it or not. If you're going to base all decisions on whether or not you can make money from them then you may as well just port a corporation in charge of a country (although this seems to be exactly what a lot of crazy Americans think would be ideal...)

It is an asset that can be rented. Since Space X is not going to be launching rockets everyday, then the pad should be scheduled and rented to whomever wants to launch rockets from it. I do not care if it is Kari Byron and LDRS.

Now here you're suddenly showing that it *isn't* all about making money - SpaceX have shown that they can launch rockets, so giving them access to the pad seems like a Good Thing. If it were just about making money then the government would be happy to rent it to someone who is just interested in paying to make sure SpaceX can't use it, but aren't interested in launching rockets themselves - that most definitely doesn't seem to be in the interests of the public, *who are the people the government are supposed to be serving*.