[AdverseAffect]

> There is already much discussion about the current state of Russian industry and its ability to maintain the standards of yesteryear. Whatever the outcome of the inquiry, this event will only heighten those concerns and will underline to the US in particular the need to bring online new rocket systems. These vehicles, produced by the Boeing and SpaceX companies, are set to make their debut next year.

Is it just me, or is this unnecessarily hostile writing? This is literally rocket science, and the escape mechanisms seem to have worked perfectly. And at least the Russians do have (had) a working way to get stuff to iss, so I don't think these (uncited!) accusations are called for

[danielvf]

I agree, credit to Russia for having one of only two man rated rockets in the world. But Russia’s increasing failure rates have been an industry topic for a few years now though - it’s a valid concern.

Here’s an article from two and a half years ago, “What’s the matter with Russia’s rockets?” after a string of similar failures with unmanned rockets. http://www.planetary.org/blogs/jason-davis/2016/20161201-wha...

[tzfld]

The Russians had too many issues with their launchers in the past years, so this seems to be part of a trend, and not an isolated case.

As you said, this is rocket science. High corruption level and incompetent officials can be very destructive in domains like space exploration.

[adrianN]

Eh, launch failures are probably approximately Poisson distributed. It's not unlikely for them to appear in clumps.

[solarkraft]

Unfortunately that's not a great argument for moving more of the work to the US :-)

[adventured]

The US doesn't suffer from a very high level of corruption. So yes, it's a reasonable argument for moving more of the work to the US.

Transparency International ranks the US with Belgium and just behind Australia and Iceland on corruption.

Russia is #135, below Ukraine and Myanmar.

[craftyguy]

Maybe a case of "the corruption you might stand a chance to expose, vs. the corruption you don't"?

[jaypeg25]

Might be a little hostile but none of it is inaccurate. American space experts have bemoaned the fact that we have had to rely on Russia to send people to Space since retiring the Shuttle, and have discussed its impact on national security, the economy, and just our plain old scientific knowledge.

[AdverseAffect]

Thanks. After reading up on it more, I agree. But Since BBC did not offer any follow up links, context, quotes or other sources for their claims, it sounded like unfounded accusations (to my uninformed ears)

[sschueller]

I agree, the writing seems quite hostile. Everything get politicized immediately nowadays which is quite sad.

[gameswithgo]

Sir, there was nothing political about the quoted paragraph assuming that it is accurate that the industry have been discussing russian space reliability. In fact it would be you who has politicized it now.

[AdverseAffect]

I'm not following news about space, and was just going from what I read. he article did not provide any context or sources for these claims. Now that HN has filled in thw gaps, it does sound like Russia might have a problem with their tech. But imo BBC should have quoted either other articles or experts on the matter when making statements like this

[ryanwaggoner]

Ma’am, something being accurate doesn’t preclude it being political.

[standerman]

Interesting comment considering you've submitted several articles that were quite negative about Elon Musk.

[hef19898]

And that is not necessarily politicizing, at least not in a narrow sense.

[sschueller]

Yes, Elon, not SpaceX.

[ItsMe000001]

I'm not sure how I feel about that argument, did we really just find a place where public attacks on a person are better? I would think at most people actually involved in something that relies on the person may have a valid argument for such a thing, if it sticks to a concrete subject they actually have reason to care about. Other than that, I don't see the general public getting involved in discussions of a person (as such, in general) as a good thing.

[sschueller]

If I am trying to determine if I should buy or sell TSLA because the CEO just called another man a "Pedo" or claiming "funds secured" I think discussing what this man has said is justified.

[vasili111]

This is what cold war looks like and it has not begun several years ago. Cold war just has not ended yet.

[smittywerben]

Seems reminiscent to media sentiment left after the Cold-War era. [0]

But I'm not knowledgeable in this area. I'm glad the safety worked as intended. I think space travel is necessary but expensive.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_Challenger_disas...

[Entalpi]

Everyone is not a rocket scientist nor an avid reader of space industry magazines and thus it kind of makes sense to gove the reader a bit of insigh in the general direction of the industry.

[vasili111]

Just too many problems with the Russian space program recently. It is systematic problem and not an exception.

[erazor42]

BBC article, UK is not exactly best friend with Russia. (cf. Skripal stuff)

[Koshkin]

“Great Britain has no friends, only interests."

[vasili111]

Does Russia has any friend?

[gdy]

Yes, oil and gas, err, I meant fleet and army.