
NASA to Make Major Announcement Today About Astronaut Transport to the ISS - adam_klein
http://www.nasa.gov/press/2014/september/nasa-to-make-major-announcement-today-about-astronaut-transport-to-the
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pseudometa
I can only imagine it is related to this announcement from SpaceX...

[http://www.spacex.com/press/2012/12/19/nasa-selects-
spacex-r...](http://www.spacex.com/press/2012/12/19/nasa-selects-spacex-
return-americans-space)

"Hawthorne, CA – Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) today won a $440
million contract with NASA to develop the successor to the Space Shuttle and
transport American astronauts into space."

"SpaceX expects to undertake its first manned flight by 2015 – a timetable
that capitalizes on the proven success of the company's Falcon 9 rocket and
Dragon spacecraft combination. While Dragon is initially being used to
transport cargo to the International Space Station, both Dragon and Falcon 9
were designed from the beginning to carry crew."

~~~
Shivetya
there were numerous stories submitted here today that point to Boeing winning

~~~
adam_klein
There is a good chance for a joint award (SpaceX/Boeing).

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washedup
According to the follow sources, one of the winners is Boeing in a joint
effort with Jeff Bezos' company Blue Origin:

[http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/16/us-boeing-
lockheed...](http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/16/us-boeing-lockheed-
martin-bezos-idUSKBN0HB0UU20140916)

[http://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/2014/09/16/reports-
boe...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/2014/09/16/reports-boeing-to-
beat-out-spacex-for-nasa-contract-thanks-to-jeff-bezos/)

[http://seekingalpha.com/news/1984465-boeing-lockheed-
bezos-t...](http://seekingalpha.com/news/1984465-boeing-lockheed-bezos-to-
develop-new-rocket-engine)

[http://www.cnet.com/news/boeing-said-to-win-nasa-space-
taxi-...](http://www.cnet.com/news/boeing-said-to-win-nasa-space-taxi-
contract/)

~~~
gedmark
Surprised this is the top comment. Your first link is reporting on an
unrelated military program to replace the RD-180 rocket engine. The other four
links are all blog spam using the same source: the Wall Street Journal article
by Andy Pasztor. Pasztor is well known in the aerospace industry for writing
what you might call "speculative" articles based on not much more than rumor.

Edit: here's the WSJ article so people can go to the original source. You'll
need the google trick to get around the paywall.
[http://online.wsj.com/articles/boeing-takes-lead-to-build-
sp...](http://online.wsj.com/articles/boeing-takes-lead-to-build-space-
taxi-1410820865)

Fair warning I don't think it has any actual news content. The expected
outcome was that Boeing and SpaceX would both be winners, but because SpaceX
is always cheaper, Boeing would get a larger amount of money.

It certainly could be true, but the official announcement is in two hours so
probably just makes the most sense to wait and see what happens rather than
post more speculation.

~~~
washedup
I found some better sources and cleaned up the links. Thanks for pointing that
out. The purpose of the links is to shed more light on what is happening and
the relationships among the companies and government bodies.

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trhway
if it goes like a typical gov contract then Boeing wins and later it buys
rides on SpaceX when its own dev program costs spirals out of control with no
real progress in sight.

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mactunes
According to this article Boeing beat SpaceX.

[http://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/2014/09/16/reports-
boe...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/2014/09/16/reports-boeing-to-
beat-out-spacex-for-nasa-contract-thanks-to-jeff-bezos/)

~~~
anarcticpuffin
I'm curious what the implications of that are. My emotional reaction is
disappointment that "the old guard" is winning because of NASA's risk
aversion. But is that really the case or am I just living in the Musk-worship
echo chamber? Is Boeing still something to get excited about? How much cheaper
would a Space-X solution be per astronaut trip versus Boeing (if at all)?

~~~
forgottenpass
_But is that really the case or am I just living in the Musk-worship echo
chamber?_

It's probably not the Musk echo chamber, your assumptions carry the telltale
scent of the "large corporations can't do anything right!" echo chamber.
They're slower, suffer from inefficiencies caused by scale, more risk-adverse,
etc... But they're not outright incompetent the way startup-fellating media
leads you to believe.

Boeing could have just delivered better. Or they delivered worse but Boeing's
track record covered the spread in a reasonable way. Or in a nepotistic way.
The fun part is that unless they blew SpaceX out of the water, you'll never
know which of the three it is!

~~~
api
It's not large corporations per se, but traditional government contracting
where the implicit incentive is to deliver minimum value at maximum cost.

------
washedup
Looks like they are going to announce the CCtCAP award winners:
[http://www.spacepolicyonline.com/news/rumors-swirl-about-
imm...](http://www.spacepolicyonline.com/news/rumors-swirl-about-imminent-
cctcap-announcement)

------
snowwrestler
Washington Post: NASA to award space contract to Boeing and SpaceX

[http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-
switch/wp/2014/09/16...](http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-
switch/wp/2014/09/16/nasa-awards-space-contract-to-boeing-and-spacex/)

> NASA plans to award a much-anticipated, multi-billion dollar contract to
> ferry astronauts to the International Space Station to both Boeing and
> SpaceX, according a person familiar with the process.

~~~
marktangotango
>> United Launch Alliance is expected to counter that tomorrow by announcing
that Blue Origin, the space startup founded by Washington Post owner Jeff
Bezos, would develop an American-made engine for the Atlas V, according to
another person who is close to the situation. ULA is a joint venture between
Boeing and Lockheed Martin.

Here's hoping Bezos doesn't blow the barnacles off the F1 they fished out the
ocean and pass it off as a new 1.5 million lbs thrust engine :)

------
beltex
Result:

 _" The partnership w/ @Boeing & @SpaceX promises to give more people the
opportunity to experience the exhilaration of spaceflight"_

[https://twitter.com/NASA/status/511970135935295488](https://twitter.com/NASA/status/511970135935295488)

------
BatFastard
Boeing is being selected due to its being the "least risky" option.

IMHO NASA needs to start taking some risks. It is amazingly slow and inept. So
much so that I would consider shutting it down completely and allocating the
money we spend as grants over the next 10 years to get private industry
viable.

When the Dutch group asked for volunteers for its one way mission to Mars, how
many viable candidates signed up? 10,000? NASA ruled during the 60s, since
then it has been just another government bureaucracy.

~~~
headcanon
There's a lot more stuff under the NASA umbrella than manned spaceflight that
do a lot of great science (Such as the JPL) and are generally some of the best
at what they do, so I wouldnt advocate shutting down the whole program,
however I would agree that building launch vehicles is not something they
should handle themselves. I would have preferred them to be championing
SpaceX, but it seems big, slow, hulking bureaucracies have an affinity for
each other.

Unless NASA's already got a rocket they've been developing in secret, I'd say
SpaceX could put up a person in orbit faster than NASA+Boeing can with theirs,
given their respective track record.

~~~
araes
NASA has been developing the Space Launch System (SLS) [1] since the 2010
Authorization Act killed the Constellation program. If it means anything,
they're through their Preliminary Design Review and heading towards their
Critical Design Review. They expect somewhere between 70 metric tons to 155
metric tons to LEO depending on the version of the design. Whether it will
fly, who knows, but they are actually farther along than NASA has gotten on a
space vehicle in a while.

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Launch_System](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Launch_System)

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zokier
Is it just me or is the "Launch America" banner completely ridiculous? Of
course NASA is government agency and the subject is highly political, but
still...

~~~
lotsofmangos
Come on you apes, you wanna live forever?

 _They 're doing their part. Are you? Join the Mobile Infantry and save the
world. Service guarantees citizenship._

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ck2
Less money going to Russia the better, now if only they would do the same for
the middle-east.

------
adam_klein
Boeing CST-100 awarded $4.2 billion and SpaceX Dragon $2.6 billion.

------
dfrey
I really dislike announcements of announcements.

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jseip
Boeing, SpaceX, Lockheed?

~~~
adam_klein
Boeing, SpaceX, Sierra Nevada?

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8296567](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8296567)

------
madaxe_again
"Astronauts now given free* pouch of Snapple for their ascent."

*to the astronaut. $4.2bn per pouch from Lockheed-Snapple.

------
VLM
"SpaceX is scheduled to launch its fourth operational cargo mission to the
ISS, SpaceX CRS-4, this Saturday, September 20."

My guess is spacex got disqualified so boeing won because elon was found
stowing away in a space suit in this saturday's launcher. That would severely
ruffle some feathers.

