FYI,

"SpaceX, Rocketplane Win Spaceship Contest
- $485 million to be doled out for new ways to resupply space
station"
MSNBC
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14411983/from/ET

: Two aerospace teams headed by SpaceX and Rocketplane Kistler will
: share almost half a billion dollars set aside for demonstrations
: of new spaceships capable of transporting cargo and crew between
: Earth and the international space station, NASA announced Friday.

: The Commercial Orbital Transportation Services program, or COTS,
: marks a dramatic departure in the way NASA does business and could
: give a boost to the nascent private-sector space race — including
: space tourism for paying passengers.

: Critics of NASA's traditional approach to spaceship development,
: on the other hand, tend to see COTS and similar initiatives as the
: space agency's best hope. "If anything's going to get us out of
: this hole, it is this new entrepreneurial spirit," Jerry
: Pournelle, a science-fiction author who also served as a space
: policy adviser to the Reagan administration, told MSNBC.com.

: With the rise of less expensive rockets, "we will see human
: transportation to low Earth orbit become more of a reality in the
: next four or five years," said Will Trafton, executive vice
: president for business development at Rocketplane Kistler.

: Elon Musk, SpaceX's founder and chief executive officer, told
: MSNBC.com that "this is going to be the best value for money that
: NASA and the American taxpayers have ever received."

: COTS is different in that NASA will be merely "investing" in
: projects primarily supported by the private sector, with quarterly
: payments made as the development teams reach technical and
: financial milestones through the end of 2009. The final milestones
: call for three test flights, including an unmanned flight to the
: space station itself, said Alan Lindenmoyer, commercial crew/cargo
: project manager at NASA.

: The spaceships developed with NASA's support could well help fill
: the gap between the scheduled 2010 retirement of the shuttle fleet
: and the start of CEV flights in the 2012-2014 time frame.

: When the first phase of the COTS program runs out in 2010, NASA
: says it will conduct another competition for pay-as-you-go
: contracts to resupply the space station. Officials have compared
: it to renting a moving van rather than having one custom-built for
: your exclusive use. Such "vans" can be used for non-NASA purposes
: as well, ranging from private-passenger joy rides to commercial
: research flights.

: The applicants for those future NASA contracts are likely to
: include Friday's winners, but would also be open to other COTS
: competitors that were passed over.

: California-based SpaceX, or Space Exploration Technologies, has
: been developing a line of Falcon 1 and Falcon 9 rockets, as well
: as its Dragon capsule for cargo and crew.

: If SpaceX hits all of NASA's milestones, its team would receive
: $278 million, Lindenmoyer said. He said SpaceX's proposal was
: particularly attractive because its launch vehicle could be
: recovered and refurbished — and eventually could be fully reusable.

: Musk said the Falcon/Dragon system could be used to resupply the
: space station as well as take passengers to private-sector space
: complexes such as those currently being tested by Bigelow
: Aerospace. "We expect Bigelow to be a significant customer along
: the road," he said.

: That meshes with NASA's intentions, he said: "NASA really wants us
: to find markets outside just them in manned spaceflight."

: Musk declined to say precisely how much the Falcon/Dragon flights
: would cost on a per-pound or per-flight basis, but was confident
: his team could bring down the cost of access to space dramatically.

: "We expect to be quite a bit more cost-effective than Soyuz, and
: as you know, Soyuz is 6 or 7 percent of the cost of the space
: shuttle," Musk told MSNBC.com.

: Oklahoma-based Rocketplane Kistler, meanwhile, plans to adapt the
: Kistler K-1 reusable launch vehicle — which has been under
: development for years by Kistler Aerospace but has never flown.
: Rocketplane acquired financially troubled Kistler just this year,
: specifically to go after the COTS money.

: Rocketplane has been working on a suborbital spaceship that could
: be ready for flight in 2008, and Trafton said the first Kistler
: K-1 orbital rocket could lift off from Australia in late 2008. He
: said his company was looking into developing a Cape Canaveral
: launch site as well, and studying the design for a crew-capable
: vehicle that would fit atop the K-1. The crew vehicle could enter
: service in the 2011-2012 time frame, he said.

: For example, Musk said SpaceX would invest $200 million in the
: Falcon/Dragon program — on top of the $100 million he already has
: spent on the Falcon 1. Trafton declined to provide a specific
: figure but said Rocketplane's contribution would exceed NASA's on
: a 2-to-1 basis — implying an investment of more than $400 million.

: It's possible that someone could "come out of left field" and win
: a Phase 2 contract even though they didn't receive NASA money in
: Phase 1, he said. That means the four other finalists in the
: Phase 1 competition could still be in the running in 2010. Those
: also-rans included:

: - Texas-based Spacehab, which built research modules for the space
: shuttle. Spacehab offered its Apex line of spacecraft for the COTS
: competition. Its partners included Adam Aircraft, The Aerospace
: Corp., Emergent Space Technologies, Oceaneering and BAE Systems
: National Security Solutions.

: - The Virginia-based t/Space consortium, which has been working on
: a Crew Transfer Vehicle, or CXV. The consortium includes
: AirLaunch, Constellation Services International, Orion Propulsion,
: Carnegie Mellon University's Robotics Institute and RedZone
: Robotics, Universal Space Lines — and Scaled Composites, which
: built the SpaceShipOne rocket plane.

: - California-based SpaceDev, which worked on SpaceShipOne's hybrid
: rocket engine and proposed its Dream Chaser mini-shuttle concept.
: Its partners included Adam Aircraft, The Aerospace Corp., Emergent
: Space Technologies, Oceaneering and BAE Systems National Security
: Solutions.

: - Andrews Space of Seattle, which already has received an Air
: Force contract to flesh out a Hybrid Launch Vehicle concept.
: All the finalists said that they would pursue their spaceship
: projects even if they didn't share in the $500 million from NASA.

Mark Reiff