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Pressure is mounting on Boeing and SpaceX, both companies trying to prove that the United States can still fly humans to space. Both should miss a November 2019 deadline for the production of certified spacecraft as safe enough to carry astronauts, which means NASA could, in a humiliating way, find itself locked out of the International Space Station. next year. With private companies to fly astronauts, known as the commercial crew program, is the most serious effort to do space travel business as usual. If it fails to deliver, the risk investment dreams leading to lunar exploitation and orbital hotels will be even more unlikely.
The Government Accountability Office last week (pdf) projected that the vehicles of the two companies will not be certified for operational use. This could leave a gap of one or more months between the latest US astronauts to fly and return to the Russian spacecraft Soyuz, and the first flights of the private American spacecraft
. Russia to reach the International Space Station. As it takes years to organize a Soyuz flight, NASA has virtually no option to bridge the gap except to delay existing flights for a month or two. Without the American astronauts on board to operate the space station, the ISS can only function, according to the space agency, which "thinks" about new solutions. "19659002" Spacecraft and rockets designed for NASA's Commercial Crew Program must meet criteria requirements before companies are certified to launch crews in space, "said a spokesman. NASA word in Quartz. "Compliance with these requirements has always taken precedence over the calendar."
What is sure, exactly?
It is dangerous to send people into space. The simple fact of going into orbit requires a vehicle that reaches 17,500 miles per hour or more by burning tons of kerosene and liquid oxygen in just minutes. And that's where the fun begins, because one of the biggest dangers facing astronauts are the microminerals and debris that orbit around the Earth and can damage or destroy their spaceship
. For the last time in 2011, to determine how to ensure that the spacecraft that he buys are safe, NASA invented a metric called "Crew Loss" that attempts to predict the chances of Astronaut lost. Their badysts determined that the space shuttle had a 90-chance to lose a crew member, although the first launch of the space shuttle had a probability of 1 in 12.
NASA imposed a requirement from 1 to 270 But reaching this number is difficult: Kathy Leuders, head of the program of the commercial team of NASA, said in 2017 that she does not expect that that one or the other of these vehicles meets this standard. Instead, NASA expects to receive waivers for a safety threshold greater than 1 in 150 chance of losing a crew member.
The new audit indicates however that there is no agreement on how to determine this number between the agency, the commercial crew program, its safety officer and the private contractors. Some use old data on orbital debris, while others use newer data with more cataloged space debris, which makes reaching the security benchmark more difficult. Some include the effects of operational activities to reduce risks beyond the design of the vehicle, such as inspecting the spacecraft for damage caused by high-definition cameras after reaching the orbit, while others do not do it
.
The Commercial Crew Program was born out of a public-private partnership with SpaceX and OrbitalATK that began in 2006, allowing a regular cargo service to the International Space Station. In 2014, the Obama administration attempted to recreate this success with astronauts by signing $ 4.2 billion contracts with Boeing and $ 2.6 billion with SpaceX after several years of small-scale development with half a dozen companies. hoped to launch its first astronauts in 2016, and Boeing in 2017, with both loans for operations that year. Problems were already apparent: in its early years, the program received just over one-third of its planned funding, which, according to the auditors, resulted in two years of delay. Now, Boeing says it's going to steal astronauts in November 2018 and SpaceX in December 2018, with both being certified for operations in 2019. In private, few of the industry or the space agency have trust in these dates.
The GAO report said, in April, NASA's average estimates were that Boeing would be ready for operations in December 2019 and SpaceX in January 2020. In mid-June, he stated that NASA "runs a program billions of dollars without trust in his hourly information. " Publicly, both companies remain confident about reaching their current milestones. Jessica Jensen, director of Dragon Mission Management at SpaceX, told reporters last month that her team was preparing for an unmanned test flight scheduled for August. A test of the Boeing emergency abortion system, scheduled for July, remains unresolved, with a spokesperson telling Quartz that his team "is currently badessing the possible dates."
Delays not all of the private sector: vehicles, NASA engineers need to perform a thorough technical badysis after the test flights, but the organization lacks people to do it with any one speed.
Long way to the launchpad
In 2015 and 2016, SpaceX lost Falcon 9 rockets in explosive accidents. As a result of the latest outage, SpaceX redesigned an essential part of its Falcon 9 rocket: composite cylinders that hold helium to pressurize the propulsion system. But these new bottles still have not flown. They are expected to debut in the first unstuck demonstration of the Dragon II probe, still scheduled for August.
In April, SpaceX still needed to show the strengthened engine that it deployed for the first time this summer. t show any cracks in its turbopump blades after use. And the company must also demonstrate that it can safely load fuel into the Falcon 9 while the astronauts are on board, a plan that initially raised concerns but is now being considered by the experts of security as a viable option.
This was to adapt the Atlas V rocket (built by United Launch Alliance, its joint venture with Lockheed Martin) to its spacecraft, dubbed the CST-100 Starliner. This required changes to meet unexpected aerodynamic loads, and NASA still worries about not having enough information on whether the Atlas V launcher prevents or controls cracks that could lead to catastrophic failures. "
The ULA is also working to give NASA sufficient insight into its RD-180 engine, manufactured by a Russian company under an agreement that limits information on how it is manufactured and designed. NASA also feared that when the Starliner returned to Earth, it would be dropped a heat shield that could affect and damage the parachutes designed to safely bring the astronauts back home. A spokesman for Boeing told Quartz that further badysis shows that "the Starliner's heat shield will never be in contact with critical equipment during nominal flights."
The race to orbit, delayed
Putting people into orbit has been at the center of the 21st century space business – with mediocre results up to # 39, now.
In 2004, the X-Prize demonstrated that a human could fly with a relatively modest budget of about $ 20 million. Still, the effort to commercialize this technology through Virgin Galactic by Richard Branson has lasted more than fourteen years. The company's efforts to do suborbital space tourism are still underway, with the hope of getting out of the atmosphere again this year.
Blue Origin, the space company founded by Jeff Bezos, is also very close to putting people in space for a few minutes at a time on the New Shepard Reusable Rocket. Elon Musk launched SpaceX in a more pragmatic way by building unmanned rockets to fly satellites in orbit and cargo.
Elon Musk launched SpaceX in a more pragmatic way. at the International Space Station. But his goal has always been to take humans into space, and relying on NASA's vast experience and budget, it seemed that SpaceX could be a cost-effective way to put people in orbit. The serious participation of the Boeing aerospace giant in the commercial crew program has validated the decision of the space agency to hire astronauts for its transport services rather than its own. fly.
But Boeing will survive – even thrive – without commercial crew, thanks his mastery of NASA's traditional approach to space technology. The future of SpaceX depends on its ability to show that it can outsmart this traditional model, even if the founder for whom NASA had demanded a special life insurance policy is busy in the future. other companies and involved in quarrels on social networks
. ] With delays beginning to threaten the operation of the International Space Station, SpaceX and Boeing will have to deliver. Both say they will perform two critical test flights and certify their vehicles in the next six months. If they fall on this sprint, Houston will really have a problem.
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