Two senior NASA officials published their response at the end of the report, saying that the agency is assessing SLS. This includes a new joint review called a “cost and schedule confidence” analysis and an independent technical and program assessment.
“NASA leadership will review the results of these assessments and then rebaseline the SLS program. NASA will communicate the results of these reviews to Congress and will comply with all applicable reporting requirements,” said the statement , which was written by Douglas Loverro , NASA associate administrator for human exploration and operations, and Thomas Whitmeyer, NASA acting deputy associate administrator for exploration systems development.
Boeing’s statement on the inspector general’s report also acknowledging difficulties with development but indicated to results that will pay off in future builds of SLS.
“Such an undertaking has certainly had its cost and schedule challenges over.” the years, but the investment has paid off in bringing together the required talent, technology and tooling to build this unprecedented deep-space rocket, “Boeing officials said in a SpaceNews report . “The hard-earned experience acquired during initial SLS development is resulting in significant savings and efficiencies in subsequent development and production.”
The Office of Inspector General acknowledged that there is “difficulty of setting baselines long into the future,” but warned that the full SLS program cost “will not be readily transparent, because NASA is not tracking and reporting all costs against an official baseline.
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