The US spent something like 4% of its budget each year on NASA to get to the moon.
I think the risk adverseness is a big part of the reluctance. Most of the Astronauts in Apollo believed that people would die during the mission and had about a 1/3 chance of death on any given flight.
The calculated risk on the Space Shuttle was about 1/288 based on failure of components.
I think that level of minimizing risk really complicates the program. When you put scientists rather than military test pilots I think the level of risk that is willing to be accepted is much lower.
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