Voices What Do You Think?
Is a Delayed Rocket Still on Schedule?
Rocket Lab moved the first launch of its Neutron rocket into 2027 after finding voids in a first-stage tank dome, and the Reporter asked five residents whether the rocket is on time.
“A schedule is a promise with a date on it. If the date moves, the promise moved, and I keep the old one in a drawer so I can tell who is lying.”
Phyllis Okonkwo-Brandt, 67 Retired hospital scheduler “It’s on schedule if you read the schedule from the back. I have a rocket in my head that launched in 2024, and it’s doing great.”
Dante Russo, 26 Barista “The rocket is on schedule. The schedule is wrong, that’s the schedule’s fault, and I have never once been late to a sprinkler.”
Gene Pallister, 58 Sprinkler installer “I’m not an engineer, so I don’t know about the holes. I know that when the mechanic says six weeks, it means six weeks, and I’ve stopped asking which six.”
Marisol Vance, 41 Dental hygienist “I don’t believe in rockets. I believe in feed, and feed has never once said it was going to be early and then wasn’t.”
Duane Hartzell, 73 Retired feed store owner