15 models of spacecraft advanced to the next stage in the competition for the vehicle that will replace the space shuttle.
Avi Blizovsky
The spaceships that will replace NASA's aging shuttles may take off like an airplane, receive a boost from booster rockets that will return to Earth for reuse, and one of the important steps will be to eliminate the role of the pilot.
The space plane, which can be used multiple times, will be equipped with systems for an emergency exit and safe evacuation of the crew members in the event of a malfunction, as well as an automatic landing system. Thus it will be much safer than the space shuttle. That's what the agency officials say, revealing 15 planned models. According to them, the next generation of ferries will be much cheaper to operate.
The goal is for the new spacecraft to fly starting in 2012, the date when the space shuttles will retire from service after about thirty years. "It will be a slightly smaller craft, so it won't be as impressive as the shuttle, and it won't be as big a show at launch," says Dennis Smith, director of NASA's Launch Initiative, a $4.8 billion program.
As mentioned, one of the features of the spacecraft will be the possibility that the launch missiles will separate from it, and fly back to the launch area. Today, two shuttle boosters are parachuted into the sea and brought to the launch site by ships.
NASA will use the new ships to launch astronauts and equipment to the International Space Station and industrial and commercial companies as well as the US military will use a slightly different model to launch satellites into orbit.
One of NASA's main goals is to reduce the cost of launching payloads into orbit around the Earth from $5,000 per kilogram in today's shuttle to $500 or less. Another important goal is to reduce the risk of a fatal malfunction from today's 1 in 500 to 1 in 10,000. Crew members currently lack an escape system in case something happens during launch, as indeed happened in 1986 to the space shuttle Challenger. If NASA wants to change the margin of error, it should take care of such a system, says Sami't.
Smith says the ejection seats are being tested for this, as well as crew cabins capable of independent flight. The Kennedy Space Center may be used as a launch site, although this will not be necessary. Also, it has not yet been decided whether the takeoff will be horizontal or vertical. The spacecraft may also double the escape capacity of the International Space Station. Also, there will be no need for pilots when the system will be fully automated.
Over the past year, NASA has reduced the number of models to 15 out of the thousands of ideas that have been put forward. The 15 ideas have been put forward by three industrial entities: Boeing, Lockheed Martin and the joint company Orbital Synthesis and Northorp. The models are based on two-stage launchers with engines powered by gasoline, hydrogen or a combination their.
NASA plans to settle on one or at most two models next year. Full development of one of the models will begin in 2006 and the first flight is expected in 2012. In the event of a delay, NASA plans to keep its shuttle fleet flight-ready until 2020.
"We reached the moon within nine years of the decision to do so and we developed the shuttle within eight years. Here we have ten years to fulfill our commitment and arrive at a new system." Smith concludes.
In the photo: an artistic concept of a "space taxi" concept designed for reuse by Northrop. Illustration - NASA
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