SpaceX Dragon set for manned flight in May

Atlantis flew the 135th and last space shuttle mission in July 2011, and we’ve relied on the Russians to get into space ever since.

Thankfully, the long hiatus of manned U.S. spacecraft missions will soon be over, beginning with the first crewed SpaceX Dragon flight. It will take two NASA astronauts to the ISS in May if no further delays occur.

Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner will likely fly one more unmanned flight this year, and should fly a manned mission no later than next year.

Sierra Nevada’s Dream Chaser spaceplane is scheduled for an unmanned first flight in 2021, but it’s unclear if the vehicle is still intended for manned missions.

Artemis 2, the first manned Orion spacecraft mission, is scheduled for late 2022. It’s planned to fly a circumlunar mission — the first manned spacecraft to escape the Earth’s gravity since Apollo 17 in December 1972.

SpaceX will attempt a manned circumlunar flight with its reusable Starship vehicle no sooner than 2023.

Artemis 3, scheduled for 2024, could see the first manned lunar landing since Apollo 17.

These are exciting times for U.S. manned space flight.

I like the way they give these programs names of immortal gods. The Apollo program had some deaths. Maybe the gods were immortal but the astronauts are not.

a reply to: rickymouse

Of course accidents will happen but if I were an astronaut in these times where solid fuel boosters land themselves I’d feel relatively safe. Those early guys were absolutely nuts.

If you’ve ever watched a live spaceX launch with all of the monitoring and such, it’s a new age.

Can I hitch a ride? I want to get off this ball. I have a towel.

None of this would be possible under Bernie. Musk would take his toys and leave. Bernie wants to take care of every person breathing on the ground first regardless if they are lazy and obese. He would cut NASA's budget and would not give Space Force a dime.

a reply to: Stupidsecrets

He will never be President.

Little steps like this in the OP are great. It really is Important to undertake these infant stages of space exploration.
Our descendants will thank us.
The planet and the star it orbits are not going to be here forever.
It’s cool to think we might be able to outlive our own planet of origin.

Good luck SpaceX

a reply to: Stupidsecrets

Seems to me the push for space exploration and engaging the private sector was began under Obama. Also Musk isn't going anywhere else and I personally think it's cheap political scoring to even mention as much.

Yea it was great in Time at NASA and Russia under Obama! Totally devastated the space program, I was there and saw it. He was more interested in helping bring us all together, a real humanitarian.a reply to: RAY1990

a reply to: litterbaux

SpaceX Falcon 9's use kerosene and liquid oxygen. Solid rocket boosters can't land themselves.

The ULA vehicles still use solid rocket boosters, SpaceX does not. That includes the Atlas V, and the Vulcan and SLS which are still in production phases.

SpaceX's Starship will use methane and liquid oxygen and will land itself making it the first crewed vehicle to land itself with propulsion.

Im glad to see SpaceX leading the way.

a reply to: WUNK22

The Space Shuttle was canceled under Bush Jr., the last mission flew under Obama. Obama did not devastate the space program.

The Space Shuttle was a costly death trap that killed 14 Astronauts and lost 40% of its fleet.

Now a commercial space industry is leading the way. SpaceX started launching rockets with Obama as president and won the many contracts including the manned mission one under Obama.

It is completely ignorant to say Obama devastated the US space program.

It’s remarkable that at least three different manned spacecraft are on the verge of flight, all developed in one nation. That number could increase to four or five manned spacecraft in the near future.

Blue Origin has been working on manned flight since at least 2010. Jeff Bezos is intensely interested in manned lunar missions, and his New Glenn launch vehicle with its ability to place 100,000 lbs. in LEO, can make it happen.

Dream Chaser was originally planned to carry up to six astronauts to the ISS, but Sierra Nevada appears to be concentrating on delivering supplies to the station and carrying away trash.

originally posted by: jrod
a reply to: litterbaux

SpaceX Falcon 9's use kerosene and liquid oxygen. Solid rocket boosters can't land themselves.

The ULA vehicles still use solid rocket boosters, SpaceX does not. That includes the Atlas V, and the Vulcan and SLS which are still in production phases.

SpaceX's Starship will use methane and liquid oxygen and will land itself making it the first crewed vehicle to land itself with propulsion.

Im glad to see SpaceX leading the way.

I’ve never liked using solid-fuel rockets for manned flight. Once you start them, they can’t be turned off or throttled down. The SLS will use solid-rocket boosters, and I can’t help thinking about the Challenger disaster, caused by failure of an O-ring seal in a solid-rocket booster.

a reply to: Scapegrace

I'm still convinced that Bridenstine will manage to delay a manned SpaceX launch until after Boeing's, while somehow also lambasting SpaceX for the delays and funneling even more money to Boeing.

a reply to: jrod

President Bush had us on track to shutter the Shuttle program and get us back into space with indigenous vehicles with his ambitious Vision for Space Exploration in 2004. Under these guidelines we would have ran the Shuttles until 2010 while developing the Constellation program (admittedly plagued by delays and budget issues) to have its first flight in 2014. We also would have been back to the Moon this year. In fact, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter was launched in support of this agenda.

President Obama, in 2010, cancelled all of his predecessor's ambitious plans and implemented his own. This cancellation set NASA back years, while in turn not really saving any money; continued development of Constellation or the realignment each cost several billions of dollars. Shifting the focus to Mars, while admirable, was placed so far in the future that it was essentially a meaningless gesture, much like the entire shift in policy.

President Obama did decimate NASA.

a reply to: cmdrkeenkid

Moving away from manned spaceflight is all I've ever seen NASA do in my lifetime, I can't remember any plans for the shuttle to go any further than LEO. People just didn't like their money spent on manned space flight was the gist I got. Plus much more could be achieved with automation and probes.

When it comes to getting to space what exactly are we doing? Supplying the ISS and that's about it...

Personally I reckon applying capitalism to space wasn't a happy mistake and all the private companies pushing to get into space ain't doing so for exploration and scientific purposes.

I hear often on ATS how US government funded programs and entities are always wasteful with money, public sentiment can be as powerful as any president. It's the private sector that drove our recent innovations.

Russia kinda had the right idea, India pushed heavily into putting foreign hardware into space and the private sector is obviously doing what it does. What did NASA do?

Telecommunications drove the recent push for space, some people like Musk have greater end goals but ultimately money is a good enough driving force.

That being said can NASA legally be a profit driven organisation?

I fail to see how mentioning space exploration and politics is cheap political scoring. It takes investment (capitalism) and tax dollars to push the boundaries. One of the front runner candidates does not like capitalism and does not like space exploration. From his own comments, he wants to fix people problems on the ground first. Just something to think about if one likes space exploration and advancing technology. People can hate billionaires all they want but the main people pushing space exploration are billionaires. Besides SpaceX there is also Breakthrough Starshot being ramped up by Zuckerberg.

originally posted by: cmdrkeenkid

President Bush had us on track to shutter the Shuttle program and get us back into space with indigenous vehicles with his ambitious Vision for Space Exploration in 2004. Under these guidelines we would have ran the Shuttles until 2010 while developing the Constellation program (admittedly plagued by delays and budget issues) to have its first flight in 2014. We also would have been back to the Moon this year. In fact, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter was launched in support of this agenda.

President Obama, in 2010, cancelled all of his predecessor's ambitious plans and implemented his own. This cancellation set NASA back years, while in turn not really saving any money; continued development of Constellation or the realignment each cost several billions of dollars. Shifting the focus to Mars, while admirable, was placed so far in the future that it was essentially a meaningless gesture, much like the entire shift in policy.

President Obama did decimate NASA.

This still to this day pisses me off. The only reason I can imagine why he did that was ego. He wanted HIS name associated with the future of our space program, not Bush's, and in order to accomplish this he was willing to set us back and leave us without a viable spaceflight program for years.

Also, I know this is nitpicking, but this isn't really accurate:

originally posted by: Scapegrace

Artemis 2, the first manned Orion spacecraft mission, is scheduled for late 2022. It’s planned to fly a circumlunar mission — the first manned spacecraft to escape the Earth’s gravity since Apollo 17 in December 1972.

I saw similar terminology just last night on a show about the Apollo program, about the missions to the moon "flying beyond Earth's gravity" which is not true. What do folks think is holding the moon in its orbit around Earth? That would be Earth's gravity, which extends to the moon and beyond. No manned spacecraft has ever left Earth's gravity.

ETA: If you want to get really technical, the range of Earth's gravity is infinite. This applies to everything that has mass. For practical purposes though, the effective range of an object's gravity is determined by its Hill sphere. For Earth, according to the article, that extends out to about 1.5 million kilometers.

a reply to: Scapegrace

It is important to note that the Atlas V(ULA) and Cyngus(Nothrop Grumman) both use Russian made main engines. The Vulcan that is supposed to debut next year will use Blue Origin engines, but still be expendable.

Because of SpaceX's success with landing boosters, other space agencies are now looking into the concept. Funny that 10 years ago they said it was impossible and a waste of time and money to try.

originally posted by: Stupidsecrets
I fail to see how mentioning space exploration and politics is cheap political scoring. It takes investment (capitalism) and tax dollars to push the boundaries. One of the front runner candidates does not like capitalism and does not like space exploration. From his own comments, he wants to fix people problems on the ground first. Just something to think about if one likes space exploration and advancing technology. People can hate billionaires all they want but the main people pushing space exploration are billionaires. Besides SpaceX there is also Breakthrough Starshot being ramped up by Zuckerberg.

This is unfortunately true of almost any topic. It's funny when I see people whining about how politics comes up in so many "unrelated" threads here, when in fact politics is related in very real ways to almost everything that gets talked about here. Conspiracy theories almost always have some political element to them.

originally posted by: litterbaux
a reply to: rickymouse

Of course accidents will happen but if I were an astronaut in these times where solid fuel boosters land themselves I’d feel relatively safe. Those early guys were absolutely nuts.

If you’ve ever watched a live spaceX launch with all of the monitoring and such, it’s a new age.

Spam in a can... those first astronauts.. hell any astronaut still that climbs on top of all that power has balls or ovaries or titanium. Still, I am amazed and in awe watching those boosters being remotely flown back and landed. Hopefully this new era has significant achievements and safety records

a reply to: RAY1990

Where did I say NASA should be a profit driven organization? NASA has provided more than ISS resupply, especially in the last few years with the commercial contracts.

a reply to: face23785

Oh, you mean like the recently proposed House bill to push NASA's Lunar landing to 2028 instead of 2024? Who controls the House right now?

Almost like they're worried that President Trump would win reelection and they don't want the end of his second term capped off as the man who took us back to the Moon.