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Reusability of spacecraft was SpaceX's biggest selling point. In the meantime, Boeing will stay true to the concept.
Elon Musk's SpaceX – a society revered by many as groundbreaking in all of space – has quietly abandoned one of its most ambitious targets, which has contributed to the popularity of the company. Without much fanfare, SpaceX decided to abandon the idea of reusable spacecraft, abandoning the concept of spaceship that could land on the ground at a predetermined location.
This means that SpaceX will drown its unique spaceship in the ocean.
According to Forbes' Lorena Thompson, who also consults the private sector, SpaceX had to abandon the idea of a precision landing at a chosen location on the ground. Earlier in the month of July, Inverse and other media reported that SpaceX had abandoned the concept of the propulsive landing for its future dragon missions on Mars for security reasons.
But without the precision landing on the ground, the whole idea of reuse becomes unviable.
"What SpaceX has learned to conduct unmanned cargo missions in low Earth orbit is that it takes a long time to refurbish the spacecraft once submerged in salt water. .
According to Thompson, SpaceX says that the capsule can be reused – but only to transport goods in low orbit,
To Musk's chagrin, the closest competitor to his company, Boeing, is still loyal to the idea of a reusable astronaut capsule that could land on the ground – the Starliner. Given Boeing's background, which includes work on the NASA space shuttle program, they could benefit from it.
Ironically, the Russian Soyuz spacecraft, which is currently the only way to take astronauts to the International Space Station, lands on the ground simply because of Russia's geographical characteristics.
While the United States is striving to find their own way of sending people into space without the help of Russian rockets, NASA, currently concerned about its Mars and Moon missions , has turned to commercial companies for the assumption that today 's companies are advanced enough to tackle a task of this magnitude.
However, it soon became clear that the supervision and certification of commercial spaceflight should not be taken lightly, after SpaceX decided that it was acceptable to power its rockets with astronauts already inside, writes Thompson.
To add insult to injury, Boeing is now the only American company to have a true astronaut – Chris Ferguson – after Garrett Reisman left SpaceX last year.
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