this post was submitted on 06 Dec 2025
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Congress warned that NASA’s current plan for Artemis “cannot work” - Ars Technica (arstechnica.com)
submitted 1 month ago by otters_raft@lemmy.ca to c/space@mander.xyz
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In recent months, it has begun dawning on US lawmakers that, absent significant intervention, China will land humans on the Moon before the United States can return there with the Artemis Program.

So far, legislators have yet to take meaningful action on this—a $10 billion infusion into NASA’s budget this summer essentially provided zero funding for efforts needed to land humans on the Moon this decade. But now a subcommittee of the House Committee on Space, Science, and Technology has begun reviewing the space agency’s policy, expressing concerns about Chinese competition in civil spaceflight.

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[–] Robomekk@lemmy.ca 15 points 1 month ago (2 children)

While I agree with you on the difficulty of cryogenic fuel storage and re-fueling in orbit, the ISS does actually have some of it's own rocket thrusters. They're on the Zvezda module and are re-fuelled by Progress vehicles. Relevant section from the Wikipedia article on Zvezda:

The Service Module has 16 small thrusters as well as two large 3,070-newton (690 lbf) S5.79 thrusters that are 2-axis mounted and can be gimballed 5°. The thrusters are pressure-fed from four tanks with a total capacity of 860 kg. The oxidizer used for the propulsion system is dinitrogen tetroxide and the fuel is UDMH, the supply tanks being pressurised with nitrogen. The two main engines on Zvezda can be used to raise the station's altitude. This was done on 25 April 2007. This was the first time the engines had been fired since Zvezda arrived in 2000.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zvezda_(ISS_module)

[–] Thorry@feddit.org 10 points 1 month ago

That's pretty neat. I knew the ISS had thrusters but didn't know it could also be used to boost. Note however UDMH isn't a cryogenic fuel.

[–] mojofrododojo@lemmy.world 0 points 1 month ago

those are not boosting rockets, they're maneuver, they're also not cryogenic but UDMH, a toxic methyl derivative that was once one part of the two-part combo Devil's venom, being combined with red fuming nitric acid (!!!) and used as rocket propellant.

UDMH is both toxic and corrosive. but not cryogenic fuel.