Karin Sturm

If you include Apollo-Soyuz then there is also Vance Brand.

Would not have happened to Rob Navias...

Me too - always tended to rate 8 at least as high as 11, maybe even higher. As even Mike Collins and a lot of people in Mission Control did... Which says a lot in my opinion.

Yep, for sure. But even with no changes to the actual crew, I personally have my doubts about how a Commander Shepard would have acted in such a situation. Hence my hint on the 13 -14-switch...

Not to ignore some of his flaws, but there is definitely a rather complicated life story behind some of it, beginning with family issues, his decades of (mental) health problems. And as far as politics are concerned, a lot of them were rather right wing and never changed, unfortunately.

He always was one of my favourites, humble and with a great sense of humour. I always thought he was the ideal commander to keep 13 together - would not want to imagine the situation if originally planned crews of 13 and 14 had not been swapped...

himself who posted some of the weird stuff on his X account. Too well and precisely written compared to other "performances" in public.

Honestly for me Schmitt is worse than Aldrin. Climate change denier as a scientists with a clear mind. With Aldrin you always have to consider, especially over the last decade, that there seem to be certain issues that go way back into the past. And there are serious doubts about if it's really

I really prefer to re-watch the original Interviews, panels and keynote speeches he gave over the decades - hours and hours of really great stuff there on YouTube...

Four who walked on the Moon, Aldrin (11), Scott (15), Duke (16) and Schmitt (17), and Haise, who flew there on 13 together with Lovell.

Especially with a cut budget and a lot of highly qualified people having to leave...

I thought of this one to watch tonight...

This really hits hard - RIP one of the greatest of all times

I call you naive regarding your knowledge of media mechanisms and maybe also in some points of believing SpaceX PR. I don't know what this should have to do with what others spread on this platform.

Your beloved Starship HLS will not fly within any even futher delayed current schedule (Artemis III with it in 2027 just makes me laugh, even until end of 2028 is more than unlikely) - and this is not a result of choice, but of a huge amount of unsolved problems.

I don't care at all whether you trust me or not. You just don't work in the business, so you probably are rather naive about how the media works, about background connections, financial interests of certain people. And I am only commenting these things to make others aware of the reality, not you.

background, even if you can't directly quote these contacts or name them. I don't know if you really have no idea how this works or just pretende not to understand it...

is a big difference of what people from top management say and are allowed to say in an official interview and what others really working on the projects tell you in private, off-the-record conversations. That's why as a journalist you built a network of sources, often over decades, to get the real

The heatshield story was partly overblown both by the IG and GAO (lack of detailed technical understanding again) and the media. Also one example for a "political" delay from management side, info to make the decision that was finally made was already available for a few months. And of course there

on good terms with SpaceX. She would not be the only one to act this way though, quite a common attitude nowadays in parts of NASA management. By the way, do you really expect me to reveal my sources and probably bring them in difficulties? You must have no idea how journalism works...

You need technical background to judge if a decision makes sense and the promises made are feasable. And of course the opinion of the leader influences the way a decision is going. Maybe a certain naivity was involved as well together with the knowledge that it might be usefull for the future to be

To how many people working in the different HLS working groups in the NASA side have you spoken directly, how many in mission planning and management do you know personally? You just seem to have a view from the outside, but everybody is entitled to his opinion even if it is not based on facts.

sources. And I know exactly how this business works, how often official interviews are heavily glossed over. Especially in a high-tech environment with different companies, interests and power plays involved.

Ask the people who have worked there at the time - they could give you some background. And unfortunately the technical competence of the GAO often leaves a lot to be desired. By the way, working as a journalist for 40 years, I don't have to rely on random people on the internet, I have my internal

Yep, I think it was posted by different sources on X (I still have to be there for my F1 job anyway, so I read one or the other thing, even if I am rarely posting anymore).

I hope they didn't have to pay in advance.😂

For sure - it always did in all programs. It's just that in my opinion in this case at the current state of the program any smaller slips on the SLS/Orion side won't make any difference for Artemis as a whole, with the real delaying factors somewhere else.

Also if you already know that one part of the project will be hugely delayed anyway, why rush the other part with running the risk of overlooking something safety critical? Maybe at one point something was a bit delayed on management level for political reasons - but even this didn't really matter.

Actually they didn't as thoroughly as they should have done. Not a real surprise that the person in charge for the contract ended up in a high management position not too much later.

There is a big difference of what NASA is allowed to say in public about HLS due to NDAs and what is really going on behind the scenes. But this kind of information you only get in private, confidential talks.