[hayanno]

When we are talking about "directly observing a part of space and time never seen before. Gazing into the epoch when the very first stars and galaxies formed, over 13.5 billion years ago." I guess 2000% over budget seems fine to me. Even if you are thinking only about profit, I think the discoveries will pay for themself.

Plus I think the budget didn't jump from 500 million to ten billion dollars in on day, project grew and budget grew with it, and someone had to approve it, we are talking about multinational project, so I think everything is well documented and well approved from people who knows the project well better than us.

I do agree with you that if that was military budget, I would think that something is really wrong.