Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

NASA investigation finds Boeing hindering Americans' return to moon

flyingmag.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

181–190 of 413 posts

Re: NASA investigation finds Boeing hindering Americans' return to moon

#181

Post by Jensson »

Rinzler89 wrote: post #180
Dalewyn wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people want to deny it, but both Apollo and Space Shuttle were the results of there being a Fucking War(tm) that had to be won at any cost. Nowadays, that specific motivator is squarely with the Chinese.

But what wars has China started though in order for us to be afraid of them? If I look at the current score board in the last decades, US has invaded more counties than China (have they found those WMDs yet?), yet somehow we're (us non Americans in the west) are supposed to fear China, because reasons? Honestly, my biggest enemy right now is my own EU government who has done the biggest damage to our country and beca…

Powerful undemocratic countries are scary, if they are willing to oppress their own people they are for sure willing to oppress other people as well.

Re: NASA investigation finds Boeing hindering Americans' return to moon

#182

Post by mr_toad »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #177
School-Cotton wrote: post #23

Does anyone actually seriously believe the U.S. will land a person on the moon in 2025? This is the country that takes decades to open a new subway station.

That was always a bullshit date. No different than elder Bush's Mars in 2030. 2028, maybe if everything goes well with Starship, and the suits. Their lunar variant is still a disaster waiting to happen without a better design. We've seen how Starship destroys a launch pad with ill-conceived flame diversion. How is it going to land on unprepared regolith without toppling in its own crater or destroying the engines wit…

Starship didn’t destroy anything, that was the booster, and they’re not landing a 33 engine booster on the Moon.

Re: NASA investigation finds Boeing hindering Americans' return to moon

#183

Post by Ankaios »

akira2501 wrote: post #30
dotnet00 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because Congress critters use it as a means to spend taxpayer money on purchasing votes. They'll do pretty much anything to avoid having to admit that SLS was a mistake.

Is "Moon Policy" anywhere near the ballot box? Particularly for senators? To the extent it might be, isn't it the inverse problem, to cancel the program is to lose jobs. So they're mostly just being held hostage by the monopoly. The person you are voting for has fantastically small power. Which, is not what we were taught, but it does seem to be the fact.

Is "Moon Policy" anywhere near the ballot box? Particularly for senators?

It is in Huntsville.

I suggest you read up on former Senator Richard Shelby.

Re: NASA investigation finds Boeing hindering Americans' return to moon

#184

Post by Rinzler89 »

Jensson wrote: post #181
Rinzler89 wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But what wars has China started though in order for us to be afraid of them? If I look at the current score board in the last decades, US has invaded more counties than China (have they found those WMDs yet?), yet somehow we're (us non Americans in the west) are supposed to fear China, because reasons? Honestly, my biggest enemy right now is my own EU government who has done the biggest damage to our country and beca…

Powerful undemocratic countries are scary, if they are willing to oppress their own people they are for sure willing to oppress other people as well.

>Powerful undemocratic countries are scary

Just like all the other undemocratic dictatorships the west is "friends" with and turn a blind eye to their anti human rights actions?

Re: NASA investigation finds Boeing hindering Americans' return to moon

#185

Post by ipaddr »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #171
ipaddr wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would the qualified people who desire to work in that location and have better options suddenly work for the government. If the idea is to train non-experienced people that's what Boeing did. What is going to prevent them for leaving for other local work that pays better once they have some experience. What the government should have done is reduce their pay for missing deadlines by having milestones in the contr…

Because government jobs are secure, Boeing subcontractor jobs where you are a cheap disposal cog are not. If you don’t see the value in security to someone making $20-$40/hr who needs healthcare benefits, you might start there. A union fixes this in the long term, but that will take time. Government can employ rapidly. Something, quickly, needs to change before we forget how to build because MBAs, accountants, and la…

A welder making double outside of the government would take a chance the more experience they have. Similiar to how many people here would rather get a job at Amazon vs the government. Chances are you are out in a year or two compared to a government job where you can survive longer for half of the pay.

Remember we are talking about experienced aircraft welders. They are not available for 20 an hour when industry is paying so much more.

Re: NASA investigation finds Boeing hindering Americans' return to moon

#186

Post by toomuchtodo »

ipaddr wrote: post #185
toomuchtodo wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because government jobs are secure, Boeing subcontractor jobs where you are a cheap disposal cog are not. If you don’t see the value in security to someone making $20-$40/hr who needs healthcare benefits, you might start there. A union fixes this in the long term, but that will take time. Government can employ rapidly. Something, quickly, needs to change before we forget how to build because MBAs, accountants, and la…

A welder making double outside of the government would take a chance the more experience they have. Similiar to how many people here would rather get a job at Amazon vs the government. Chances are you are out in a year or two compared to a government job where you can survive longer for half of the pay. Remember we are talking about experienced aircraft welders. They are not available for 20 an hour when industry is…

Collins Aerospace is offering $19/hr for third shift welding work on aircraft. It was referred to me by someone in the labor community, and I spoke with HR under the guise of a prospective candidate to confirm. They do $26B/year in revenue.

Re: NASA investigation finds Boeing hindering Americans' return to moon

#187

Post by JumpCrisscross »

edmundsauto wrote: post #178
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if we were to have made these workers government employees The problem is monopoly. Spacefaring isn’t exactly the type of work that attracts the safe and secure job for life types. (Most folks I know at SpaceX would have chosen another career if the only option were a public job at public pay with public promotion limits.)

What do you think has changed since the 1960s? There were high paying private industry union protected skilled jobs, but many people went to work for NASA.

> What do you think has changed since the 1960s? There were high paying private industry union protected skilled jobs, but many people went to work for NASA

We were spending more money. There was competition among contractors. And there were skilled low-level labourers from WWII.

Re: NASA investigation finds Boeing hindering Americans' return to moon

#188

Post by [deleted] »

Mistletoe wrote: post #144
sgnelson wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you read the OIG report, it states: "Michoud officials stated that it has been difficult to attract and retain a contractor workforce with aerospace manufacturing experience in part due to Michoud’s geographical location in New Orleans, Louisiana, and lower employee compensation relative to other aerospace competitors."

New Orleans is one of the greatest cities in the world and definitely has access to experienced welders, this argument makes no sense to me.

[deleted]

Re: NASA investigation finds Boeing hindering Americans' return to moon

#189

Post by JumpCrisscross »

whatshisface wrote: post #76
DSMan195276 wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that you can't run a large engineering department based on "Bob says Steve isn't that good". It just doesn't scale, that's the whole reason metrics get introduced.

You can if you know both Bob and Steve because you are their manager...

> You can if you know both Bob and Steve because you are their manager

Apollo involved almost half a million people. You cannot manage that on gut feel.

Re: NASA investigation finds Boeing hindering Americans' return to moon

#190

Post by Gud »

nradov wrote: post #151
wmf wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Old Space companies will never adopt fixed price. NASA just needs to drop them.

That sounds good, until it leaves NASA entirely dependent on SpaceX as a single supplier. For better or worse, there don't seem to be any other companies (old or new) that are able to successfully execute on huge fixed-price contracts.

No, but there will be. Besides SpaceX there is also Rocketlab who has a CEO rocket nerd in charge.
Post reply on HN