Sierra Nevada Corp.’s Dream Chaser flight vehiclePHOTO:NASA/REUTERS
(THE WALL STREET JOURNAL) U.S. government space officials on Thursday picked incumbents Space Exploration Technologies Corp. andOrbital ATKInc.,along with closely held Sierra Nevada Corp., to ferry cargo back and forth from orbit in the next decade.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration officials said the arrangement, under which each contractor will get at least six unmanned missions to the orbiting international space station, is designed to provide maximum flexibility in price, schedule and mission assurance. Additional missions will be awarded later.
The decision vaults Nevada-based Sierra Nevada, which provides components and systems for space and aerospace applications to commercial and military markets, into the top tier of NASA contractors.
The commercial contracts will be fixed-price, but the agency said the precise costs will depend on when, how many and what types of missions ultimately are ordered.
The maximum total value of the contracts is about $14 billion through 2024, but agency officials said they don’t expect to spend “anywhere close to that.”
Plans call for about four cargo flights annually, but it isn’t clear how those will be allocated and how many more may be added as experiments and maintenance on the aging international laboratory ramp up.
Agency officials repeatedly said the contracting decision announced Thursday helps promote the White House’s broader goal of “fostering a commercial economy in low-earth orbit.”
Orbital ATK and Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, already are performing under contracts awarded seven years ago to deliver and return cargo from space. Both suffered catastrophic launch failures last year.
In picking Sierra Nevada, the only contractor using a winged vehicle instead of a capsule, NASA chose an option able to return and touch down on a runway, with the added benefit of more quickly returning experiments and subjecting them to less landing stress.
Julie Robinson,NASA’s chief scientist for the space station, said in a news conference that Sierra Nevada’s proposal calls for returning vulnerable plant and animal experiments, as well as various other types of biological samples, within hours after touchdown. Current procedures can take a day or more.
For Sierra Nevada, which previously didn’t win a share of NASA’s commercial contracts to ferry astronauts to and from the space station, the cargo contract provides a major financial and prestige boost. It represents a vote of confidence by NASA in Sierra Nevada’s space plane, dubbed Dream Chaser, the appearance of which resembles the retired space shuttle and which is designed to launch on top of a rocket.
Like the space shuttle, the Dream Chaser is intended to return to Earth by landing on a runway like a conventional airplane. Its wings are folded on ascent, but company officials have said the mini-version of the shuttle will be able to use even commercial landing strips if necessary.
In their presentations to NASA, Sierra Nevada officials have argued that their solution offers technical and operational benefits compared with the space capsules operated by their two rivals. Some missions will require capsules using parachutes to return to land, instead of splashing down in water.
Orbital ATK will use versions of its existing Antares rocket and Cygnus spacecraft, while SpaceX will use derivatives of its Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon capsule.
By choosing all three contractors, NASA may be increasing the eventual cost of the entire program, but it is ensuring maximum technical diversity and avoiding the political controversy of leaving one of the bidders out in the cold.
NASA previously eliminatedBoeingCo.andLockheed MartinCorp., which are in line to begin transporting astronauts to the station as early as 2017, from the cargo-delivery competition.