Musk complained to NASA for flight to Jupiter
Elon Musk first complained to NASA for losing the tender to run.
SpaceX requires to explain why the scientific mission of the selected rocket competitor, if the rocket Mask a third cheaper.
The American Corporation SpaceX billionaire Elon musk started an unusual lawsuit that draws attention to the way in which in the US are allocated public funds for the space industry, and specifically at the launches of spacecraft in the interests of the state.
SpaceX has decided to appeal the decision of NASA, its primary customer, who for no obvious reason, she handed the contract for the launch of the interplanetary mission of its longtime competitor, and for much more money.
We are talking about the launch of the mission Lucy, which will be sent to the so-called Trojan asteroids of Jupiter in October 2021. 31 January NASA announced that the tender for the launch was won by old rival SpaceX — ULA consortium, a joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin.
While the launch itself and “other related mission costs” are estimated at $and 148.3 million
The launch will be carried out with the help of a rocket Atlas 5 401 configuration. “Nothing is more pleasing to us, as the fact that NASA has selected ULA to launch this amazing space mission,” said Tory Bruno, ULA Executive Director. A NASA spokesman Tracy young has confirmed that the tender was won on a competitive basis, however, refused to disclose the number and names of bidders.
However, as expected, another participant of the tender was the company SpaceX, which lost, and, according to the publication SpaceNews, challenged the results of the tender in the U.S. the chamber. Details of the complaint are not yet clear, it is known only that the Agency must make a decision on this issue no later than may 22.
However, it is also known that after a complaint from SpaceX, NASA has suspended work on the contract with ULA.
“NASA has released the order to stop work after he challenged the result of the tender, filed in the court of auditors. NASA always follow the schedule of the missions, but not ready to comment on the case under consideration”, — said the representative of NASA Yang.
In most SpaceX also confirmed the filing of a complaint. “Since the beginning of SpaceX to launch missions for NASA, this is the first of our appeal against the decisions of the Agency — said the Corporation. — SpaceX has proposed an option with extremely high confidence in the success of the mission at a price much below the amount named. Therefore, we believe that the decision to pay a lot more Boeing and Lockheed for the same mission does not serve the interests of the Agency and American taxpayers.”
According to sources in the space industry of the United States, SpaceX has proposed sending missions to non-refundable version of the Falcon 9 rocket with a maximum payload. According to the publication, the key factor in choosing a supplier of launch services was the need for a strict keeping of time.