lykan2 Retiring the space shuttle has been the best thing to happen to aerospace since the original space race. It essentially started a new space race with the new space companies like Blue Origin and SpaceX. The shuttles were to expensive and far too dangerous to sustain. 30 years was long enough. At least with Orion and Crew Dragon we can actually travel beyond low earth orbit. Shuttle could never do that. Shuttle never explored either, I am looking forward to NASA being able to explore again with Orion.
Mariano Martínez SpaceX lands their Falcon9 rockets on drone ships, not their Dragon spacecraft. Orion is a spacecraft not a rocket. Orion also has no thrusters capable of propulsive landing.
So, they recover the module with a cargo ship... AFTER removing ON THE SALTY WATER the crew... why don't they recover the module WITH the crew inside and let them land on the ship more safely?
As I view this, I can't help but lament how NASA seems to have been floundering for decades and decades. Except for the ISS, we seem to have been without a goal. These exercises with the Orion are almost carbon copies of the same ones we did with the Apollo in the 1960's and the 1970's. At least with the current administration NASA seems to have a purpose again, as so eloquently stated by Christopher Kraft and Gene Kranz at our last Apollo reunion.
