SNC via NASA

Sierra Nevada Corp.'s Dream Chaser space plane prototype is lifted into the air by a helicopter for a captive-carry flight test in May. The Dream Chaser is one of several proposed spacecraft that could be cleared for liftoff by the FAA and NASA in the coming years.

By Alan Boyle

NASA and the Federal Aviation Administration have worked out their division of labor for clearing a new generation of private-sector spaceships for liftoff putting the aviation agency in charge of any crew-carrying spacecraft that launches and lands, but requiring the space agency's additional signoff on any missions it's paying for.

The arrangement was set out under the terms of a memo signed this month. It's in line with Congress' mandate that the FAA regulate spacecraft to protect public safety, while letting spaceship companies fly private passengers at their own risk.

"As it stands today, our regulatory authority is associated with the launch and re-entry itself," acting FAA Administrator Michael Huerta explained today during a media teleconference. "We don't have any charter or authority to do anything beyond that, at least until 2015."

That's when the "fly at your own risk" mandate runs out, and it's also just about the earliest time that any of the companies developing crew-carrying spaceships will be ready to fly passengers.

NASA has been paying four companies Blue Origin, the Boeing Co., Sierra Nevada Corp. and SpaceXmore than $400 million to develop spaceships for flying U.S. astronauts. Today, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said NASA expected to announce which companies will be involved in the next phase of the commercial crew program by mid-July. Under the terms of a compromise worked out with congressional leaders, the program will give its full support to two spaceship teams, and roughly half that level of support to a third team.

The companies involved in the program have generally said they'd be ready to fly their craft as early as 2015, assuming that they receive adequate support from NASA. Bolden, however, is focusing on 2017 for the resumption of U.S.-based crew launches to the International Space Station.

The White House requested $830 million to support the program in the next fiscal year, but during its budget deliberations, Congress has been setting aside no more than $525 million."We will ask for a significant increase in 2014 and the other years if we are to hold to the 2017 first-flight date for commercial crew to the International Space Station," Bolden told reporters.

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NASA and FAA work out spaceship rules