Business, Political Commentary, Space

CCDev Winners Announced

25 Comments

NASA wanted to wait until they had some certainty in their budget, so with the passage of the CR last week, they made the announcement today. I’ll be interested to see more details when I get some time, particularly as to what Blue Origin will do with their twenty-two million. But I found this statement by Ed Mango politically interesting:

“The next American-flagged vehicle to carry our astronauts into space is going to be a U.S. commercial provider,” said Ed Mango, NASA’s Commercial Crew Program manager. “The partnerships NASA is forming with industry will support the development of multiple American systems capable of providing future access to low-Earth orbit.”

While I agree with that (and it’s been true for years, really ever since Mike Griffin decided to waste money on Ares), it can’t thrill defenders of either SLS or MPCV on the Hill.

25 thoughts on “CCDev Winners Announced”

  2. Great news… I’m glad to see that the primary recipients (Boeing, SnC, and SpaceX) were the ones who are furthest along, and the most likely to succeed.

  3. I forgot to say that I’m also glad that two proposals were rejected…
    1. ATK (for obvious reasons)
    2. USA (shuttle extension should not be linked with commercial crew efforts)

  4. I don’t understand why SpaceX isn’t the highest ranking recipient by a large margin given that they’re so obviously far ahead of anyone else in having a vehicle and launcher ready to deliver.

  5. Cecil,

    Actually Boeing may be ahead of SpaceX with “crewed” capsule development. We know they’ve had abort engine tests, and have airbag under development. Atlas V has the launch abort system either partially or mostly worked out.

    Elon says 3 years from today (2014) for crewed Dragon. Boeing says crewed test flights in 2015.

    I am thrilled. This is just the start, and no matter how much Congress screws up NASAs budget, these awards go forward. It looks like we’re finally going to see multiple commercial LVs to the ISS.

    It’s huge.

  6. “it can’t thrill defenders of either SLS or MPCV on the Hill”

    … presumes that the point of SLS / MPCV is to yield an actual launcher / orbital vehicle.

    Please note their predecessor never yielded such. What if the point is simply to fund a perpetual HSF project that never completes e.g. the funds to vendors / contractors / constituents … not necessarily completing anything.

    That’s one of the benefits of govt run development … it doesn’t have to result in anything in any time. And then you can blame it as well for being so inefficient to boot.

  7. … presumes that the point of SLS / MPCV is to yield an actual launcher / orbital vehicle.

    No, it just presumes that they would prefer to avoid having the public hear statement that, shall we say, heightens their contradictions…?

  8. Cecil T.,
    NASA emphasized that the amount of funding wasn’t tied to the ranking. It was tied to the amount of money the bidders asked for. It appears SpaceX got less than Boeing because SpaceX needed less than Boeing.

  11. Bennett, I wouldn’t say that Boeing is further along in crew capable development, I’ve heard the claim made that the Dragon that SpaceX orbited was fully capable of supporting a crew save an escape option. Boeing’s vehicle hasn’t flown.

    Mrmandais, I see your point. And based on past performance I’d say it is almost a sure bet that SpaceX can and will accomplish more with it’s $75 million than Boeing will with its $92 million.

  13. yes, but BO isn’t being funded to do that.. they’re just being funded to develop a crew capsule that can land on land and launch on an expendable launch vehicle.. just like SpaceX but without the advantage of doing cargo first.

  16. With the exception of cargo Dragon to crewed Dragon, none of this is spiral development yet. Spiral development adds requirements and capabilities in successive blocks of operational systems, each with its own development cycle. Think GPS Block I, GPS Block II, GPS Block IIA, GPS Block IIR, and GPS Block IIF. The CCDev rounds, so far (and with the exception of crewed Dragon), are just successive phases of the same development cycle for the same block of operational systems (the CST-100, the Dream Chaser, and now the Blue Origin SV).

    Not a judgement good or bad — it just is what it is.

    FWIW…

  18. CCDev rounds : Spirals by any other name.

    Spiral development is one aspect of the right way to do it. Steidle was right. Milestone-based payments and ongoing competition are other aspects. Steidle is right again…

  19. BO is so secretive that there’s nothing out there to give us any idea of what their TSTO concept looks like.

    Based on the New Shepard (sp?) concept, I’m assuming it’s to be VTVL.

    Does anyone know otherwise, or have any more info than I do?

  23. Mabey he has a different timeframe than you do. Nine women can’t make one baby in one month. He has announced he is going to build it. He has the finances to back it up. What more do you want?

  24. Blah, Blue Origin was founded before SpaceX and they’ve achieved about a tenth as much.. it should be clear that Jeff isn’t willing to put the kind of personal investment into Blue Origin that Elon has put into SpaceX. XCOR have achieved more than BO and they don’t even have a billionaire.

  25. One of the problems BO has is they don’t have an immediate market as SpaceX does. Second, they have to have fuel to not just go up, but to come down again. It may require refueling in orbit to be doable at all even if just SSTO is doable. It may be they have no place to go and are looking for ways (like making a capsule) that saves face.

    People often confuse billionaires with smart people.

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