It's so much further advanced than anything anyone else is working on, does it really need to be on schedule? I feel like "on schedule" only pertains to non-research-intensive projects.
More bigger != more advanced != more economical != more sensical
And anyway yes there are programs that are dependent on Starship working on a schedule. If it doesn't work on schedule, those programs will advance without it and the Starship program will eventually fail.
SpaceX has had 165 launches in 2025 (although admittedly 75% of those were for Starlink...) Obviously bigger isn't more economical or sensical, and most cases are served just fine with the Falcons, but there are cases we need the big boy for, and it's good that someone is working on it and has made so much progress.
Obviously a semblance of a schedule is good to have, but realistically, that's not really how research works. Look at James Webb telescope, it was originally scheduled for 2007, and ended up launching 14 years later. It's still an amazing piece of engineer/science, and it's amazing that it's up there now, even if it was very late to it. It's much better to be late and successful than early and failing.
> but there are cases we need the big boy for, and it's good that someone is working on it and has made so much progress.
I am taking issue with this claim. Are there cases where the cost/benefit actually come out favorably for Starship as it is actually turning out? Are they cases anyone should actually care about beyond sci-fi fantasies (i.e. not "colonize Mars")?
Sure, I have crappy mobile reception a lot of times on my travels, so I'll be the first when finally Starship can launch satellites with antennas big enough so that my mobile phone can directly be used for internet access.
There are so many individual features in this program that have never been done or even attempted before. That's "Advanced" in my book. Yes, they attached it to an overly ambitious program that is rife with delays (and hubris) but the program started on its own, is the best path to making the 2028 landing happen (it won't), and on its own is incredible.
The alternative to Starship needs to solve many of the same problem and is from a less proven company. If they can do it, great but I don't think its more likely.
Starship is going for a fully reusable upper stage. Google "second system syndrome." This is engineering by fiat. It could easily take another 10 years for upper stage reusability to be demonstrated, and another 10 to make it reliable. And that's generous because it implies that other problems like in orbit refueling will get solved in parallel. How many starship problems have actually been solved in parallel?
I became a starship skeptic because I thought the project management was bullshit. Nothing I've seen changes in my mind about that.
I hate the typical "second system syndrome" nonsense. People always only use that for things that fail, while in reality plenty of second systems are good, technically and/or commercially.
Starship has come as close to landing an upper stage as its possible on water, and from orbital velocity. That's already a huge accomplishment and the landing on land has also been demonstrated.
Problems are constantly being worked on in parallel. Transferring fuel between tanks in the Ship is literally something already tested and that's a big part of the validation of inter-ship fuel transfer. There was even a NASA contract about exactly that. There is parallel work on the launch site, ship the booster and the interior (this is just less visible but its being worked on as we can see from the contract).
Orbital refueling can continually be worked on even if some ships fail landings.
> It could easily take another 10 years for upper stage reusability
Or it could take less ...
And even so, if we ever want a serious moon base, an architecture like that is required. The tiny BlueOrigin lander might be ok for flags and footprints but not to deploy serious infrastructure.
On schedule pertains to anything where extraordinary schedule claims are unnecessarily made. Nobody would have to think about a schedule in this context if somebody did not regularly make bold schedule claims.
And anyway yes there are programs that are dependent on Starship working on a schedule. If it doesn't work on schedule, those programs will advance without it and the Starship program will eventually fail.