NASA Modifies SpaceX Contract to Allow Reuse of Crew Dragon, Falcon 9
NASA has modified its $2.7 billion commercial crew contract with SpaceX to allow Elon Musk’s company to reuse Falcon 9 first stages and Crew Dragon spacecraft for transporting astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS).
The reuse of the boosters and spacecraft will begin with the second commercial Crew Dragon flight, which will likely be launched in 2021. The first commercial mission with four astronauts aboard is scheduled to launched on Aug. 30.
In return, SpaceX has agreed to extend the ongoing Crew Dragon Demo-2 flight test from two weeks to up to 119 days. The spacecraft, currently docked to the space station, was launched with astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley aboard on May 30.
The contract modification added the requirement for SpaceX to conduct joint training with the U.S. Air Force’s 45th Operations Group Detachment 3 (DET-3) for the first six commercial Crew Dragon launches.
DET-3 forces are placed on alert at Patrick Air Force Base in Florida, Joint Base Charleston in South Carolina and Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii in case Crew Dragon astronauts need to be rescued due to a mishap.
Crew Dragon and its booster’s first stage are designed for reuse. A Falcon 9 first stage landed on an offshore drone ship on Thursday after launching for the fifth time. Cargo Dragon vehicles has flow to ISS multiple times.
25 responses to “NASA Modifies SpaceX Contract to Allow Reuse of Crew Dragon, Falcon 9”
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Looks like NASA has gotten officially comfortable with past Dragon 1 refurb and reuse as well as future such for Crew and Cargo D2 and also with the same anent F9 and is combining explicit recognition of this fact with a way to compensate SpaceX a bit for having to wait an extra two or three months to get paid for its DM-2 milestone – which doesn’t close until crew and capsule are back on the ground.
It’s also, in part, another indication of SpaceX having replaced Boeing as NASA’s “default go-to” company in the wake of the Starliner mess of 6 months back.
But NASA’s insider insight into just how long it’s likely to take Boeing to get its crap together, anent Starliner, probably also plays a major role in this new decision. It’s a move of mutual benefit for NASA to allow SpaceX maximum flexibility in use of Crew D2s produced and refurbed over the coming two years or so to support a more frequent launch cadence during a time in which it may well be that SpaceX is NASA’s only certified ride to ISS.
If SpaceX is going to have to fly both the missions that Boeing would have notionally flown as well as those it would have done on its own for some fairly considerable length of time, allowing use of refurbed spacecraft would allow both production and refurbishment to be conducted, in parallel, at more leisurely rates than in an all-new-production scenario. That, in turn, would avoid any problems that might accrue from what would otherwise be a doubling of required build speed were the erstwhile “all-new” policy to remain in effect. NASA’s recent encomiums to SpaceX’s speed as an organization notwithstanding, NASA would find forcing such a production speed-up antithetical to its traditions and “reflexes.”
This all just reinforces my opinion that Starliner’s make-up OFT-2 mission is unlikely to be flown before sometime next year with the CFT crew test mission most probably sliding into 2022. If that is what actually happens, SpaceX could well fly most, or perhaps even all, the initial six USCV missions provided for under its current Commercial Crew contract and require an extension to said contract before Boeing even achieves certification for Starliner.
Given that Atlas V does not come back, Falcon is probably a better understood launch vehicle with more quantifiable risk. For whatever is common between Dragon 1 and 2, the same applies.
@duheagle
You are incorrect about the Commercial Crew contract (CCtCap). Each company is suppose to do one un-crewed demo flight, one crewed demo flight and up to 6 operational flights.
That just means that if SpaceX done 6 operational flights. NASA will have to negotiate a new contract for more crew transport flights with SpaceX.
Boeing is making things hard for NASA. Since there is a possibility that Boeing might not get the Starliner flying at the once per year flight rate. Which will balloon the cost of each individual Starliner flight and causes ISS scheduling issues. Then NASA might have to go the single CCtCAP provider route with SpaceX.
Not sure what you thought I was incorrect about. Extending the contract, maybe? That’s what NASA and SpaceX agreed to do with the original CRS contract. If there’s an actual new contract for crew missions beyond the 6th to ISS that seems to me to be a distinction without any consequential difference. As with the CRS extension, the vehicles involved will remain the same.
Right now, NASA’s Boeing problem seems to be whether or not that company will get Starliner flying at all and, if it does, when that will happen. I’m already anticipating that Boeing won’t be getting Starliner certified for at least two more years.
If there are issues with flying even one mission to ISS per year in Starliner, I’m sure there is contractual language specifying under what circumstances NASA is permitted to cancel its CC contract with Boeing for non-performance.
But NASA is not going to just dump the whole thing in SpaceX’s lap – it wants dissimilar redundancy. If Boeing gets dumped, I’m sure there will be instant broad smiles at SNC when the call comes in asking how soon it can have a Dream Chaser ready to fly crew.
Re: “…when it comes to asking how soon it can have DreamChaser ready to fly crew”
Considering how long it took SpaceX to get there from it’s [cargo] Dragon, “how soon” probably isn’t the most appropriate choice of words 😉
Boeing will get Starliner flying – well, unless they give up (which isn’t impossible considering that they are dealing with problems on multiple fronts)
yes, the deep dive into the vehicle has shown an enormous amount of well bad things 🙂 its just amazing
After the nature of the mission sequencer was revealed, I’m not surprised at anything. If I were NASA I’d want to see where all the money went and how the engineering teams were made up.
Andrew I am surprised at everything I have read and been told. there are problems with software that are well lets say “normal” and then there are problems with software that are just faulty test procedures, faulty testing and faulty sim work.
the closest thing I have seen to this level of “wow this is bad” was the KC46 boom and VR vision. Its just hard to believe (at least for me) that certain people who I have thought a lot of…well didnt see problems and do a dive into them
it reminded me of my days with the shuttle program just zounds
McD did SOOO much damage to Boeing.
Or Starship crew is available. The problem of course is Starship is probably too big to dock directly with ISS. Not in terms of mass, but in terms of having a larger pressurized volume. Still the ISS staff might enjoy the room and luxuries a Starship would provide when docked it.
Just use the Starship as a temporary ISS component. Could at least triple the personnel as compare to the current ISS staffing level.
Not to mention having the latest research equipment since it could be updated between each flight. And since SpaceX would supply the crew to operate it every one of the additional astronauts would be able to spend all of their working time doing research.
I would argue that is not a good idea. The shuttle was that way. Starship is meant to be a transport, not a habitat. Instead, we need private space stations and even units to live in when transporting to mars, if not the moon.
This is why I continue to say that BA is not only needed, but has a bright future, if we do not simply step all over them. BA does a better job with radiation than does any of the metal skin (no secondary, and absorbs more of the high-energy rads). I think that it also does a better job with micrometeorites, but, I really do not know that.
The time for Bigelow and inflatable modules have passed. The company is currently staff by a handful of people with not much funding in the future. Also inflatable modules is no longer cost effective versus cheap steel modules that can have more radiation shielding.
The Starship is not the Shuttle. The shuttle can do up to 2 week in space due to using fuel cells as power source. The Starship is capable of going to Mars in about 4 months with crew. So it is a space habitat and will be use as such on the Moon and Mars until more permanent habitats are deployed.
Starship is in effect a mobile space station. It got about the same pressurized internal volume as the ISS even without counting the cargo deck.
Logistics from from Earth, cis-Lunar logistics, orbital propellant depot, orbital platform manned & unmanned and beyond cis-lunar missions are roles that can be fulfilled by the Starship.
DC cargo is nothing more than DC manned, with seats ripped out, & a starchaser.
Given that Dream chaser was originally designed as a crew-carrying vehicle, I don’t think the analogy holds up.
Could Boeing do what Orbital did with Cygnus? Buy Dragon flights to fill in the slots? You’d have to displace the capsule flight crew to favor the crews checked on Dragon, but the crewmembers who were along for the ride to the ISS as self loading cargo the change would be minimal.
Anything is possible, but its hard to imagine Boeing doing so.
Dream chaser.
There are several issues that have to be resolved before the Dreamchaser could be consider to replaced the Starliner.
First can it fly up to orbit on top of a launcher. There are very few orbital launches with an unsymmetrical form like the Dreamchaser on top of a rocket.
Second is the abort capabilities and limitations of the Dreamchaser from liftoff to orbital insertion. Hopefully SNC is getting rid of the previous Hybrid abort motors scheme and replacing it with something more conventional. How survivable is the Dreamchaser in ocean ditching and how long can it stay afloat.
Third can the external reentry heatshield surfaces last for up to 6 months in orbit if the Dreamchaser is use as a ISS lifeboat.
Plus the big issue that Boeing encounter with the Starliner. Does the Dreamchaser team have enough technical depth to write and troubleshoot the flight software.
U mean like when the Russians flew the similar one back in the 70s and it was not capped?
DC is no longer using hybrids.
Same heatshield as Dragon, so why not?
No, Not the same thing.
Boeing had electronics and avionics divisions. The idiots from McD actually sold off BOTH. That is why Boeing MBAs offshored this work.
SNC is busy developing their own and bringing it inhouse. THey are using L-Mart as well, but very little from Boeing.
My wife is now interviewing with Amazon (both their drone and airline) in part because she feels that Boeing is about to have MAJOR issues. Not the small ones that they have currently had. Many of the ppl let go were engineers and ppl that actually did REAL WORK. Instead, Calhoun is keeping his MBAs, just like he was taught at GE.
Those were small sub-scale vehicles.
The Cargo Dreamchaser does not have propulsion other than the RCS. It is unclear what the abort motors for
crewed Dreamchaser will be.
I repeat, external reentry heatshield surfaces. That is exposed to LEO orbital vacuum conditions for up to 6 months. The Dragon and Starliner have heatshield protected by the trunk and service module respectively until prior to reentry interface.
AIUI SNC has reverted to hybrid propulsion/escape motors, but using some sort of Vortex-related tech..
The extension of the flight to such a extended period is a real vote of confidence on how the overall system performed. Congrats to all involved.
yes this is a good thing well doneSpaceX