The Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) has selected Rocket Lab’s medium-lift reusable Neutron for the Rocket Cargo mission…Earlier this year, the company announced that its Neutron rocket will land its payloads at sea. To facilitate this, the company is modifying an offshore barge, named “Return on Investment,” to serve as an ocean landing platform for returning missions…Rocket Lab, along with Stoke Space, will now be eligible to bid against established giants like Blue Origin, SpaceX, and United Launch Alliance.
I’d definitely like to see this discussion: what use case could potentially be served by this? It will be ridiculously expensive and limited no matter what, mistakable for ballistic missile, and extremely visible.
For example maybe you have some use case where a covert special ops force needs new secure radios and for some reason it’s worth getting there in one hour instead of one day. Now you have a fiery trail visible for 100s of miles that this is happening and exactly where. No more covert
Maybe 007 is chilling in an embassy on a hostile country and Q needs to send some special equipment so he can do his job. But now you’re sending what looks like a ballistic missile into a hostile country. And landing safely in an embassy is a tough proposition.
Nothing about this is a good idea. I pointed out just one thing that makes it an utterly stupid idea, and you bring up another. Everything about this is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. This is on the level of nuking hurricanes and injecting bleach.