President of the United States is not very pleased with the cost of launching the Falcon Heavy and SLS

On Thursday, Donald Trump, the current US president, held a meeting in his office, the central element of which was the question of the cost of launching a payload into space. On the table at Trump were several models of modern missiles and calculations of the cost of launching each of them. Trump himself is not against space exploration, he seems to be a sensible idea, and he does not cut the budget for NASA.

However, he is surprised at the radically different price tag for launching the heavy Falcon Heavy launch vehicle and the NASA launch vehicle, called the Space Launch System ( SLS ). It is worth recalling that in the first case the client must pay about $ 90 million, in any case, this is the price indicated on the SpaceX website.

“I noticed that the cost of launching SpaceX rockets is about $ 80 million. In the case of a rocket, which is created by the state, the price tag is 40-50 times more. When I heard the figure of $ 80 million, I immediately remembered that from NASA I received completely different numbers, ”Trump told reporters during the interview with the White House and journalists.
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On Geektimes already published the cost of launching various launch vehicles. And SLS beats all records in this respect. So far, the agency has not announced any prices, but some experts have calculated that the launch of this heavy rocket will cost about $ 3 billion. Paying SLS launches will have to taxpayers, since there are hardly many customers who are able to lay out billions of dollars for putting their devices into orbit with this rocket.

In fact, the money that was spent on the development of SLS and the design of ground systems would be enough for 86 launches of the Falcon Heavy launch vehicle. That is why Trump (and not only him) is surprised by the huge difference in cost, which is expressed not in tens of percent, but in thousands.

There is a rhetorical question - why use a super-expensive rocket if there is a budget option? According to many experts, private space exploration is much more profitable than the state - savings in this case are obvious.

Trump believes that the first launch of the Falcon Heavy was very successful, because not only was the load launched into the calculated orbit, but it was also possible to land two steps out of three. And after redecoration, they can be put into action - again and again. And this, in turn, reduces the cost of launches even more. Actually, the goal of Mask for several years in a row was the development of return stages, which would allow saving on a rocket take-off, and a lot of money. The steps have been developed, tested many times and now it becomes clear that these are quite reliable "workhorses" that allow you to perform exactly the main task - to reduce the cost of launching a rocket.



Trump at a meeting with NASA said that rich people should invest in the aerospace industry if they support astronautics and the idea of ​​transferring part of the world's population to other regions of other planets in the solar system. “If rich people support space launches, they will only become a little poorer, but then we can already speak about flights to deep space,” he said.

Now the agency continues to spend a large amount of funds, trying to invest in time with the development. And already went talk about saving. One way is to send astronauts as a rocket crew during its first launch. And this is not a joke - NASA is seriously considering this possibility, considering its carriers very reliable.

Before implementing missions like Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo, NASA always conducted a test flight in automatic mode. The only time that the test launch was conducted with the crew on board was the Shuttle test . But then it was done because it is difficult to return the Shuttle to Earth automatically, without a pilot on board.

But the first launch of a heavy launch vehicle is a dangerous event, because defects may manifest themselves, which were hidden for the time being. Accordingly, people's lives are at stake. And the desire to save may not end in the best way, as it has happened before.