Wed, Mar 05, 2008
On Track For First Falcon 9 Delivery By End Of Year
Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) announced Monday
its newly revised mission manifest, listing 12 flights of its
Falcon 1 and Falcon 9 launch vehicles.
"We are on track to deliver our first Falcon 9 vehicle to Cape
Canaveral by the end of 2008," said Gwynne Shotwell, Vice President
of Business Development for SpaceX. "In addition, we’re
very pleased to have signed a significant new US government
customer for our next Falcon 1 flight, and will be releasing
details shortly."
The full SpaceX mission manifest extends into 2011 and lists
nine customers on 12 flights, including three demonstration flights
of SpaceX’s new Dragon spacecraft for NASA as part of the
Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS)
competition.
Target date refers to delivery of the flight vehicle to the
launch site. The actual launch date is dependent on a variety of
factors, which may include regulatory approvals, launch range
scheduling, weather, customer payload readiness and vehicle to
launch pad integration.
SpaceX is developing a family of launch vehicles intended to
reduce the cost and increase the reliability of both manned and
unmanned space transportation, ultimately by a factor of 10. With
its Falcon line of launch vehicles, SpaceX is able to offer a
light, medium and heavy lift capability, delivering spacecraft into
any inclination and altitude, from low Earth orbit to
geosynchronous transfer orbit to interplanetary missions.
As winner of the NASA Commercial Orbital Transportation Services
(COTS) competition, SpaceX will conduct three flights of its Falcon
9 launch vehicle and Dragon spacecraft for NASA. This will
culminate in Dragon berthing with the International Space Station
and returning safely to Earth. When the Shuttle retires in 2010,
Falcon 9/Dragon will have the opportunity to replace the Shuttle in
providing both up and down transportation services to the Space
Station.
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