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SpaceX To Present Manned Dragon Capsule

Posted by timothy on from the calling-shotgun dept.

camperdave (969942) writes "SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is set to unveil the Dragon V2 at a media event from Hawthorne, California, tonight at 7 pm. Pacific. The 'Dragon V2' is an upgraded, man rated version of the unmanned spaceship that has made several successful cargo trips to the International Space Station. The new craft will carry a mix of cargo and up to a seven crewmembers to the ISS. According to Musk, this is 'Actual flight design hardware of crew Dragon, not a mockup.' Following the space shuttle's forced retirement in 2011, US astronauts have been totally dependent on the Russian Soyuz capsules for ferry rides to orbit and back. The crisis in Ukraine, which has resulted in some U.S. economic sanctions imposed against Russia, also has the potential to threaten U.S. access to the ISS as the Russian government considers reciprocal sanctions of its own. 'Sounds like this might be a good time to unveil the new Dragon Mk 2 spaceship that @SpaceX has been working on with @NASA,' Musk tweeted. SpaceX is one of three commercial space companies competing for funding from NASA's Commercial Crew Transportation Capability program." (You can watch the event as a webcast.)

2 of 128 comments (clear)

  1. Re:The US will of course forbid this by ModernGeek · · Score: 3, Informative

    Musk is actually a huge Obama supporter, and Obama has been seen talking to, giving praise to, and visiting with Elon Musk. SpaceX and Elon Musk have been a huge part of the Obama Space Strategy. Any anti-obama sentiment comes from the ending of Republican-politican-approved programs, such as the Space Shuttle through companies like ATK and Boeing.

    --
    Sig: I stole this sig.
  2. Re:Seven crew? by the_other_chewey · · Score: 4, Informative

    Seven crew means it can be used as an escape capsule for the ISS.

    Well, for seven of them, anyway. There have been times when there have been a dozen people aboard the ISS.

    Not as ISS crew. This was only temporarily, while the Shuttle was visiting (record number
    of people on board the ISS is 13, but just for a couple of days: 6 ISS + 7 Shuttle).

    ISS design crew initially was 7 - but that has been reduced to 6 for the time being,
    due to the unavailability of full crew rescue vehicles.

    At the moment, 2x Soyuz are used as escape pods. A parked Dragon would help to get
    back to the initial crew size and free up a docking port. Very cool.