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Private Space Taxi Builders Pass Key Milestones for NASA
Two commercial spaceflight companies have checked off vital milestones on the path toward flights to the International Space Station for NASA, the space agency announced today (Aug. 23).
The Hawthorne, Calif.-based SpaceX has completed its Space Act Agreement under NASA's Commercial Orbital Transportation Services program, or COTS. The company is slated to launch the first of its 12 contracted robotic cargo flights to the space station from Florida's Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in October, officials said.
Meanwhile, the Dream Chaser space plane being developed by Sierra Nevada Space Systems in Colorado has reached its first milestone — a program implementation plan review — under NASA's recently announced Commercial Crew integrated Capability initiative. CCiCap is part of the agency's effort to spur the development of private American crew-carrying spaceships, to fill the void left by the space shuttle's retirement.
"We're working to open a new frontier for commercial opportunities in space and create job opportunities right here in Florida and across the United States," Bolden said from NASA's Kennedy Space Center. "And we're working to in-source the work that is currently being done elsewhere and bring it right back here to the U.S. where it belongs." [Top 10 Private Spaceships]
