{"id":735331,"date":"2026-06-14T04:32:15","date_gmt":"2026-06-14T04:32:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/735331\/"},"modified":"2026-06-14T04:32:15","modified_gmt":"2026-06-14T04:32:15","slug":"chinese-team-flags-life-threatening-glaring-weakness-in-nasas-artemis-programme","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/735331\/","title":{"rendered":"Chinese team flags life-threatening \u2018glaring weakness\u2019 in Nasa\u2019s Artemis programme"},"content":{"rendered":"<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">China and the United States are answering this in contrasting ways. Their answers could reveal the value they place on human life.<\/p>\n<p>From the Apollo Lunar Module in the 1960s to <a target=\"_self\" class=\"e1yy41x40 ef9u0v01 css-1ankfgb ecgc78b0\" href=\"https:\/\/www.scmp.com\/news\/world\/united-states-canada\/article\/3356551\/nasa-reveals-artemis-iii-astronauts-next-step-towards-moon-landing?module=inline&amp;pgtype=article\" title=\"\" data-qa=\"BaseLink-renderAnchor-StyledAnchor\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Nasa\u2019s new Orion spacecraft<\/a> for the Artemis programme, the American architecture relies on a single, powerful main engine to do the heavy lifting.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">On the descent stage, one main engine controls the entire fall from lunar orbit to the surface. On the ascent stage, one main engine is the only ticket home.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">If that one engine fails, there is no backup. This design, to quote a peer-reviewed paper published in the journal Chinese Space Science and Technology in March, \u201ccontains some glaring weaknesses\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"China and the United States are answering this in contrasting ways. Their answers could reveal the value they&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":735332,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[355493,355491,96364,64,63,512,355494,355492,279387,131,202746,128,4933,28765,285,5437,355490,1055],"class_list":["post-735331","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-american-artemis-programme","tag-apollo-lunar-module","tag-artemis-programme","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-china","tag-chinese-space-science-and-technology","tag-common-bulkhead-tank","tag-lunar-lander","tag-nasa","tag-orion-spacecraft","tag-science","tag-shanghai","tag-south-china-morning-post","tag-space","tag-spacex","tag-starship-human-landing-system","tag-united-states"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/735331","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=735331"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/735331\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/735332"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=735331"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=735331"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=735331"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}