Cosmic Log

Alan Boyle, Science Editor NBC News

11 hours ago

NASA's chief closed out the space agency's first campaign to commercialize spaceflight on Wednesday, marking a transition to more ambitious efforts to create new U.S. spaceships that could send astronauts into orbit and perhaps back to the moon someday.

"We just finished taking the Olympic torch up to space last week, and getting it back down," NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said during a televised ceremony at the agency's Washington headquarters. "So in a way, this is passing another torch."

The seven-year-long, $700 million-plus commercialization program known as Commercial Orbital Transportation Services, or COTS resulted in two new launch systems to replace the now-retired space shuttle fleet and transfer cargo to the International Space Station. SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon cargo capsule made its first delivery in May 2012, and Orbital Sciences Corp.'s Antares rocket and Cygnus capsule followed suit with a demonstration flight this September.

Both companies are moving ahead with resupply missions under the terms of contracts with NASA worth a total of $3.5 billion. Orbital Sciences' first launch covered by that contract is set for December, while SpaceX is due to send the Dragon on its next trip in February.

Bill Ingalls / NASA

Orbital Sciences' Antares rocket lifts off from its Virginia launch pad on a demonstration flight to the International Space Station in September. The Antares-Cygnus mission marked the final chapter in the COTS saga.

Bolden and other NASA officials said the lessons learned during COTS were being applied to the agency's Commercial Crew Program, which supports the development of commercial spaceships for carrying humans into orbit. More than a billion dollars has already been committed for work on three prototype spaceships offered by SpaceX, the Boeing Co. and Sierra Nevada Corp. On Wednesday, NASA said it would announce its requirements for the final phase of development on Nov. 19.

See original here:

To the moon? NASA passes the torch for space commercialization