NASA awarded a second commercial human spaceflight mission to Boeing for transporting crew to the International Space Station (ISS) with...
NASA awarded a second commercial human spaceflight mission to Boeing for transporting crew to the International Space Station (ISS) with flights beginning in 2017.
Boeing will transport the crews using its Commercial Space Transportation-100 (CST-100) “Starliner” spacecraft, that will be launched upon an Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex-41at Cape Canaveral Air Station, Florida.
The award is technically a task order to Boeing’s $4.2 billion Commercial Crew Transportation Capability contract. Boeing could provide as few as two and as many as six missions to the space station after completing human rating certification.
Boeing met a series of development milestones in order to receive NASA’s “Authority to Proceed.” Several of these milestones were accomplished in 2015 including those demonstrating integrated design maturity, qualification test vehicle readiness and reviews demonstrating flight software and checkout and control systems maturity.
Launch vehicle provider United Launch Alliance recently completed construction on the main column of the Starliner crew access tower at Space Launch Complex-41, the first crew tower to be built at Cape Canaveral, Fla., since the 1960s.
NASA has selected Boeing CST-100 Starliner and SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft to launch astronauts to the International Space Station, ending its reliance on the Russian Soyuz spacecraft.
This is the third in a series of four guaranteed orders NASA will make under the Commercial Crew Transportation Capability (CCtCap) contracts. Boeing and SpaceX received their first orders in May and November, respectively, and have started planning for, building and procuring the necessary hardware and assets to carry out their first missions for the agency. NASA will identify at a later time which company will fly a mission to the station first.
A standard commercial crew mission to the station will carry up to four NASA or NASA-sponsored crew members and about 220 pounds of pressurized cargo. The spacecraft will remain at the station for up to 210 days, available as an emergency lifeboat during that time.
