Posted
8/31/2006 05:39:00 PM
by Douglas
I'll leave my usual hyperbolic commentary out of this one, since now I don't want to piss off
either of these fine companies.
NASA on Thursday gave a multibillion dollar contract to build a manned lunar spaceship to Lockheed Martin Corp., the aerospace leader that usually builds unmanned rockets.
The nation's space agency plans to use the Orion crew exploration vehicle to replace the space shuttle fleet, take astronauts to the moon and perhaps to Mars. Reusable and like Apollo and earlier spacecraft, it is perched atop the rocket.
And now, the also-rans:
The only other competitors for the contract were a team made up of Northrop Grumman Corp., the world's largest shipbuilder and third-largest military contractor, and Boeing Co.
Wow, what a way to describe all Boeing does. But what was the difference in the proposals?
Northrop Grumman's proposal to NASA appeared to be far more detailed in technical choices than the Lockheed Martin version, which left key decisions such as reusability and landing sites up to NASA.
I guess the
Death Star joke was more apt than they first realized.