That strange sight was the second test flight of the Spaceship Neptune-Excelsior, a test capsule designed and built by U.S. startup Space Perspective. For the price of a $125,000 ticket, the company will ferry as many as eight passengers at a time around the atmosphere in luxurious, panoramic digs for six hours. It seeks to launch commercial flights in 2026 and begin crewed test flights next year.

Space Perspective refers to Neptune as a spaceship, which is a bit of a misnomer. Reaching an altitude of about 100,000 feet, the vehicle falls well short of the Kármán line—used by international groups to define the boundary between Earth’s atmosphere and space—at about 50 to 60 miles altitude. Blue Origin, for example, takes customers beyond that boundary with its space tourism offering, while Virgin Galactic reaches an apogee of about 55 miles.

But according to Space Perspective, Neptune goes high enough for U.S. regulators to consider it a spacecraft. Passengers will be able to see the Earth’s curvature and experience the overview effect, a feeling of awe reported by many astronauts who have seen Earth from space, it says.

“I’m so proud of our devoted team who has worked relentlessly to execute this mission, drawing from their deep expertise and designing solutions for never-been-seen technologies,” said Taber MacCallum, founder and chief technology officer of Space Perspective. “This uncrewed flight not only proves our pioneering technology but also brings us a giant leap closer to making space accessible for everyone and reaffirms our belief in the transformative power of space travel.”

Up, Up, and Away

Space Perspective will offer an approximately six-hour journey to the stratosphere, hovering at about 100,000 feet for two hours.

Spaceship Neptune comprises the capsule, SpaceBalloon launch mechanism, and reserve descent system, all of which are patented, the company says. Flights will be regulated under FAR Part 460 for human space flight requirements and adhere to NASA and U.S. Coast Guard guidelines. The SpaceBalloon will lift off from the company’s marine spaceport, Voyager, and splash down in the ocean. A cone mechanism will cushion the impact and serve as an anchor.

The pressurized, spherical capsule has about 2,000 cubic feet of space, enough for eight passengers plus a captain. Its lounge area is decked out with luxurious seats, foliage, and massive 360-degree windows. According to Space Perspective, its “spa-like” restroom is more lavish than what you’d find in a first-class airplane cabin.

The company’s SpaceBalloon uses hydrogen and ascends at roughly 12 mph, eliminating the g-forces experienced by astronauts. When fully inflated, it stands nearly as tall as the Eiffel Tower and could fit an entire football stadium. According to Space Perspective, the balloon cannot pop. But in the case of a contingency, an emergency system comprising four parachutes would deploy automatically.

Just about every component of Neptune—from satellite and ground communications systems to thermal controls to sensors and antennae—was designed and built in-house.

During their flight, customers will be treated to an array of amenities including food, a fully stocked bar with cocktail service, and high-speed Wi-Fi capable of connecting with friends and family on Earth. Interior and exterior cameras will capture photo and video of the experience.

Critically, no training is required. After placing a refundable $1,000 deposit, Space Perspective will walk the customer through the journey, provide regular updates, and help book travel to mission control at Space Coast Regional Airport (KTIX). The company claims it has sold more than 1,800 seats.

Space Perspective is calling Sunday’s test flight a wet dress rehearsal. Neptune completed the company’s nominal six-hour mission profile, launching from Voyager, ascending to apogee, and performing a controlled descent and splashdown.

At its peak, the company says, the capsule maintained cabin pressure and stability, with thermal management systems adjusting temperature based on outside fluctuations. Data from the flight will be used to refine its digital twin system developed in partnership with Siemens, which can recreate the mission profile virtually for additional testing. Space Perspective hopes the data will pave the way for crewed missions, which in December it said it was targeting by the end of 2024.

Sunday’s flight builds on the company’s previous test in 2021, when the balloon launched with a capsule simulator from Space Coast Air and Spaceport. Initial commercial flights will also launch from the Space Coast, though the firm is looking to add service in the Middle East, Asia, and Europe. It has so far raised $100 million from investors in support of those efforts.

Like this story? We think you’ll also like the Future of FLYING newsletter sent every Thursday afternoon. Sign up now.

The post ‘SpaceBalloon’ Lifts Off in Stratospheric Test Flight appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

Commander Jared Isaacman, the billionaire CEO of Shift4 Payments who purchased the five-day orbital flight from SpaceX, and mission specialist Sarah Gillis, one of two SpaceX engineers who are the company’s first employees to fly to space, exited SpaceX’s Dragon capsule one at a time, each spending about 12 minutes outside. The astronauts were traveling at 17,500 mph at an altitude more than 450 miles above Earth, higher than the International Space Station.

But there’s a catch. Because Dragon does not have an airlock, all four crewmembers were exposed to the vacuum of space. The mission profile added risk compared to a typical spacewalk, where astronauts enter and exit through a vacuum-sealed chamber.

“Today’s EVA was the first time four humans were exposed to the vacuum of space while completing the first-ever commercial astronaut spacewalk from a commercially-produced spacecraft in commercially-produced extravehicular activity [EVA] suits,” said Stu Keech, vice president of Dragon engineering at SpaceX.

SpaceX provided live stream coverage of the full, approximately two-hour process, which can be rewatched here.

The Falcon 9 rocket carrying Dragon and the Polaris Dawn crew lifted off from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida early Tuesday morning. Almost immediately, the astronauts began preparing for the spacewalk.

The first step was a “prebreathe” to remove nitrogen bubbles that can form within body tissues, causing decompression sickness. During the approximately two-day process, the cabin’s pressure was lowered and oxygen levels were raised gradually to help the crew acclimate.

After that, the astronauts donned their EVA spacesuits, which are designed to be worn both inside and outside the spacecraft. Developed by SpaceX with help from Isaacman’s Polaris team, the suits have endured hundreds of hours of testing and feature greater mobility, durability, and even a high-tech heads-up display (HUD).

“Building a base on the moon and a city on Mars will require thousands of spacesuits,” SpaceX said in a post on X. “The development of this suit, and the EVA performed on this mission, will be important steps toward a scalable design for spacesuits on future long-duration missions.”

After completing suit leak checks and venting Dragon down to vacuum, Isaacman opened the hatch and was first to egress. Remaining attached to the spacecraft, he used a specially designed structure called Skywalker to move around and perform tests on the suit’s thermal and mobility systems. Skywalker is equipped with several cameras that were used to capture the moment in real time.

“SpaceX, back at home we all have a lot of work to do,” Isaacman said as he looked down on the planet below, “but from here, Earth sure looks like a perfect world.”

After Isaacman returned, it was Gillis’ turn. The SpaceX engineer stepped out and performed the same series of tests, while mission pilot Scott “Kidd” Poteet and mission specialist and medical officer Anna Menon monitored her support systems.

Finally, the hatch was closed, Dragon was repressurized, and the astronauts removed their suits.

“Dragon uses pure nitrogen during ‘repress,’ which mixes with the pure oxygen being released into the cabin via the open loop system that keeps the EVA suits pressurized,” SpaceX said. “This process is unique to Dragon which acts as its own airlock.”

From venting to repressurization, the entire process took about one hour and 45 minutes.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk was quick to praise the crew for its historic achievement, as was NASA administrator Bill Nelson.

“Congratulations @PolarisProgram and @SpaceX on the first commercial spacewalk in history!” Nelson posted on X. “Today’s success represents a giant leap forward for the commercial space industry and @NASA’s long-term goal to build a vibrant U.S. space economy.”

Polaris Dawn, the first of three missions Isaacman purchased for SpaceX under the Polaris program, has so far lived up to its lofty expectations. In addition to the spacewalk, the astronauts on day two of the mission ascended to an orbital height not reached by humans since the Apollo 17 astronauts in 1972, passing through hazardous radiation belts. 

Menon also read a children’s book she authored, Kisses from Space, for her family and patients of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, live from orbit. While the Polaris missions are scientific—Polaris Dawn alone will conduct nearly 40 experiments—they are also billed as charitable endeavors to raise money for St. Jude.

Ultimately, the Polaris program may have a ripple effect on NASA’s efforts to return Americans to the moon via the Artemis program.

Polaris Mission III is expected to be the debut crewed flight of SpaceX’s Starship, the largest and most powerful rocket ever built. The space agency has asked the company to develop a lunar lander variant of Starship to land astronauts on the moon’s south pole, which will be used during Artemis III scheduled for September 2026.

Like this story? We think you’ll also like the Future of FLYING newsletter sent every Thursday afternoon. Sign up now.

The post SpaceX Polaris Dawn Crew Completes Historic Civilian Spacewalk appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

On Tuesday, as the company occasionally does when facing what it deems to be unfair treatment, SpaceX posted a lengthy update decrying the decision. According to the firm, the FAA had assured it that Starship would get the green light this month. It claims the rocket has been ready to fly since early August, an assertion CEO Elon Musk reiterated last week.

“Unfortunately, we continue to be stuck in a reality where it takes longer to do the government paperwork to license a rocket launch than it does to design and build the actual hardware,” the firm said. “This should never happen and directly threatens America’s position as the leader in space.”

With the ability to be used multiple times on the cheap, Starship is expected to be a game-changer for U.S. spaceflight. SpaceX wants to launch the rocket up to 120 times per year from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. Musk last week claimed the vehicle will reach Mars within two years.

SpaceX is also developing a Starship human landing system (HLS), a lunar lander variant of the spacecraft, for NASA’s Artemis III mission, which would return Americans to the moon for the first time in more than half a century. Starship will require a few more test flights before the mission, which is scheduled for late 2026.

That’s not much time, but SpaceX plans to get there using its philosophy of iterative design. Basically, the company puts flight hardware through real-world testing as often as possible to learn quickly and improve the chances of success on the next flight. The strategy helped it commercialize the now-ubiquitous Falcon rocket.

“The more we fly safely, the faster we learn; the faster we learn, the sooner we realize full and rapid rocket reuse,” SpaceX said.

Each Starship test flight has flown farther and accomplished more than the last. The fourth, in June, marked the first time both Starship and the Super Heavy booster made it back to Earth in one piece after the first two attempts ended in explosions.

Keeping with the trend, Flight 5 will feature the most ambitious goal yet. SpaceX will attempt to catch Super Heavy midair using two large “chopstick” arms, returning it safely to the Starbase launch pad in Boca Chica, Texas. 

The maneuver could pose risk to Starbase’s launch tower, but SpaceX says it has been preparing for years. The delay could create a ripple effect that hampers future Starship test flights. Safely returning the booster is a critical piece of the system’s reusability.

“It’s understandable that such a unique operation would require additional time to analyze from a licensing perspective,” the firm said. “Unfortunately, instead of focusing resources on critical safety analysis and collaborating on rational safeguards to protect both the public and the environment, the licensing process has been repeatedly derailed by issues ranging from the frivolous to the patently absurd.”

What’s the Holdup?

SpaceX said the FAA communicated that a launch license would be awarded this month, but the process has been delayed due to “four open environmental issues” it deems unnecessary.

Starship’s maiden voyage in April 2023 was a brief but bombastic one. The FAA grounded the rocket as it investigated the launch and explosion, which shook buildings, shattered windows, and sent ash and debris flying miles away.

The impact was more severe than SpaceX anticipated due to the lack of a flame deflector—a common fixture at launch sites that uses water to absorb energy and heat—beneath Starbase. According to Musk, the system was absent because it “wasn’t ready in time” and the company thought the pad could withstand the launch.

The FAA’s handling of Starship’s initial launch license prompted a lawsuit from five environmental groups, which the agency reportedly has sought to dismiss. With the flame deflector installed, subsequent Starship flights have not destroyed the launch pad.

However, the FAA has approved two 60-day consultations that could extend the timeline for a fifth mission.

According to SpaceX, the only proposed change to the mission’s hot-stage jettison—during which the top of the Super Heavy booster is expelled—is a new splashdown location, which it says would not raise the risk of harm to marine life. Still, the FAA signed off on a consultation with the National Marine Fisheries Service to evaluate the new site.

“SpaceX’s current license authorizing the Starship Flight 4 launch also allows for multiple flights of the same vehicle configuration and mission profile,” the agency told FLYING. “SpaceX chose to modify both for its proposed Starship Flight 5 launch which triggered a more in-depth review.”

SpaceX, though, fears the review could be longer.

“The mechanics of these types of consultations outline that any new questions raised during that time can reset the 60-day counter, over and over again,” it said.

A separate consultation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), requested by the FAA due to Flight 5’s larger sonic boom radius, could add to the delays. A sonic boom occurs as Starship slows from supersonic speeds on its way back to Earth.

“SpaceX submitted new information in mid-August detailing how the environmental impact of Flight 5 will cover a larger area than previously reviewed,” the FAA said. “This requires the FAA to consult with other agencies.”

According to SpaceX, both agencies have studied Starship booster landings and concluded there is no significant environmental impact from sonic booms. The firm also claims studies back the idea that sonic booms have no detrimental effect on wildlife—but the jury is still out on that one.

According to an evaluation by the California Coastal Commission of SpaceX’s request to increase Falcon 9 launches at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, experts don’t fully understand the effects of noise on animals. The commission rejected the request in part because sonic booms generated by Falcon 9—a less powerful rocket than Starship—force too many closures and evacuations of local parks.

“At Starbase, we implement an extensive list of mitigations developed with federal and state agencies, many of which require year-round monitoring and frequent updates to regulators and consultation with independent biological experts,” SpaceX said.

Among other things, the company says it works with a local nonprofit to transport injured sea turtles for treatment and monitors bird local populations, using drones to search for nests before and after launch and. It also “adopted” Boca Chica Beach through a Texas state program and sponsors quarterly cleanups it says have removed hundreds of pounds of trash.

A CNBC report last month, which SpaceX swiftly rebuked, alleged that the company violated the Clean Water Act. The Environmental Protection Agency, though, told FLYING it did indeed violate that law.

Days before Starship’s third test flight in March, the EPA issued an order directing the company to eliminate “unpermitted discharges,” citing a liquid oxygen spill from the flame deflector’s water deluge system that seeped into the surrounding wetlands. SpaceX was forced to apply for a new permit from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ), which it did in July, but still ate a fine of nearly $150,000 to resolve the violation.

In response, the company denied it ever discharged pollutants or operated the deluge system without TCEQ permission. According to SpaceX, the device uses “literal drinking water” and has been deemed safe by the FAA, TCEQ, and USFWS.

SpaceX further claimed that the EPA issued its order without knowledge of its TCEQ license or “a basic understanding of the facts” of the system’s operation. It added that the fines are “entirely tied to disagreements over paperwork” and stem from a simple misunderstanding.

“We chose to settle so that we can focus our energy on completing the missions and commitments that we have made to the U.S. government, commercial customers, and ourselves,” SpaceX said. “Paying fines is extremely disappointing when we fundamentally disagree with the allegations, and we are supported by the fact that EPA has agreed that nothing about the operation of our flame deflector will need to change. Only the name of the permit has changed.”

The proposed settlement is open for public comment until October 21.

Singled Out?

The implication by SpaceX is that it is being unfairly targeted for its successes.

The company is prolific within the commercial spaceflight industry—experts estimate it accounted for 87 percent of all spacecraft mass space operators sent into orbit in 2023. At the same time, it handles more NASA missions than any of the agency’s private contractors.

That dominance occasionally draws ire from competitors such as Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin, or, as SpaceX puts it, “bad-faith hysterics from online detractors or special interest groups.”

“Despite a small, but vocal, minority of detractors trying to game the regulatory system to obstruct and delay the development of Starship, SpaceX remains committed to the mission at hand,” the company said.

NASA has made it known that it intends to become one of many customers within a commercial space ecosystem, rather than a service provider, by the end of the decade. As SpaceX continues to snap up NASA contracts—including an agreement to deorbit the International Space Station, ushering in that new era—rivals and critics may fear that its supremacy will only grow.

Like this story? We think you’ll also like the Future of FLYING newsletter sent every Thursday afternoon. Sign up now.

The post SpaceX Takes Aim at FAA After Latest Starship Launch Delay appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

The 218-page document, assembled by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) at the behest of Congress, warns that NASA is prioritizing short-term missions and commercial contracts over the people and technology that make its out-of-this-world activities possible.

Per the report, the space agency’s emphasis on near-term victories and overreliance on private contractors comes at the price of a strained budget, degraded infrastructure, and exodus of talented personnel.

“NASA should rebalance its priorities and increase investments in its facilities, expert workforce, and development of cutting-edge technology, even if it means forestalling initiation of new missions,” the NASEM said.

NASEM operates under a congressional charter and comprises private and nonprofit institutions that provide independent analysis on public policy decisions. The academies release decadal reports on topics such as astronomy and planetary science, effectively giving NASA and Congress a roadmap for funding over the next ten years. The studies take years to put together and are considered influential within the spaceflight community.

Tuesday’s publication, titled NASA at a Crossroads, is a bit of an aberration. The report was requested by Congress in 2022 amid growing pressure from China, which in June became the first nation to return samples from the moon’s far side.

NASEM members met with experts, visited NASA centers, sent requests for information, and reviewed agency documents to inform their conclusions. The outlook, the organization says, may be bleak.

The State of NASA

The NASEM report paints the picture of an agency in turmoil from top to bottom.

Internal and external pressure from NASA and its benefactors has placed it in a bit of a tight spot. Agency senior center managers told researchers they would prefer to spend additional funding on new missions rather than facility maintenance or personnel training. But per the U.S. Committee on Human Spaceflight, NASA annually spends about $3 billion on missions it cannot afford.

“Each dollar of mission support that previously had to sustain a dollar of mission activity now has to support $1.50 of mission activity, effectively a 50 percent increase,” the report says.

In short, the agency’s workload is expanding more rapidly than its mission budget—and that’s absorbing money that could be better spent elsewhere.

NASA infrastructure is essential to the agency’s mission and is used by other agencies and private partners. But “chronic insufficient funding” has resulted in about 83 percent of the agency’s facilities, many of which were built in the 1960s, exceeding their design life. These aging assets are difficult to maintain, soak up valuable personnel time, and make NASA less attractive to prospective talent.

“During its inspection tours, the committee saw some of the worst facilities many of its members have ever seen,” NASEM said.

For example, according to the report, NASA’s Deep Space Network (DSN)—a network of radio dishes around the globe that receive and transmit data from missions—is too degraded to support current and planned projects without disrupting others. DSN locations over the next decade will cost tens of millions to maintain, it predicts, while contending with a thin workforce and failing infrastructure. The DSN budget in 2022 was $200 million, down from $250 million in 2010.

NASA’s employee turnover rate is largely consistent with the commercial space industry, per the report. But agency employees cited lower salaries and greater private sector involvement as deterrents to working there. In addition, NASEM found that women and minorities are underrepresented, leaving plenty of talent untapped.

Researchers worry the prevalence of certain commercial contracts, such as fixed-price or milestone-based, could make matters even worse by turning NASA engineers into contract monitors. These agreements stifle agency personnel by reducing hands-on work while opening the door for private companies to develop technology that, in the NASEM’s view, should be built in-house.

“Innovative, creative engineers don’t want to have a job that consists of overseeing other people’s work,” said ex-Lockheed Martin executive Norm Augustine, the lead author of the report, during a virtual briefing Tuesday afternoon.

A Tight Budget

NASA’s tendency to prioritize short-term missions over long-term success stems in part from a constrained budget environment.

Between 2014 and 2023, the agency’s funding actually increased by an average of more than 3 percent over the previous year. But over the past two decades, its purchasing power has essentially held flat while mission complexity has grown. During the peak of the Apollo program, NASEM estimates, purchasing power was about three times higher.

The 2023 debt ceiling agreement capped increases to federal non-defense discretionary funding for fiscal years 2024 and 2025, and NASA has felt the impact. Its 2024 budget left it with about half a billion less than it had in 2023. The 8.5 percent discrepancy between what the agency requested and what it received was the largest since 1992.

The funding cut gives NASA little wiggle room for certain missions such as Mars Sample Return, for which the agency has requested help from private industry to lower costs. Another high-profile program, the Chandra X-ray observatory, was placed on the chopping block, and several others have been delayed.

It could be a similar story in 2025. The White House’s 2025 NASA budget request, which seeks the same amount awarded in 2023, has been marked up by the House and Senate Appropriations Committees, with the latter’s proposal reading much more favorable.

Under the House budget, NASA would receive $200 million less than requested, a slight increase over 2024 in real dollars but below the current rate of inflation.

The biggest loser would be the Science Mission Directorate, which would get $7.3 billion—the same as 2024’s allocation, which represented the first cut to NASA’s science budget in a decade. A coalition of scientific organizations and more than 40 members of Congress believe the agency needs closer to $9 billion to support its dozens of space science missions.

Mars Sample Return could also suffer despite the House requiring it to spend $450 million more than NASA requested.

That’s because it would provide less than half of that money, leaving NASA to scrounge up the rest by axing other planetary science projects. The House would require full funding for certain programs, so only a few—namely Discovery, New Frontiers, and fundamental research—would be candidates for cuts. Within those programs are the critical Veritas Venus mission and Dragonfly Saturn moon mission, both of which could be jeopardized.

Also at risk is the Artemis lunar program, the successor to Apollo. NASA asked to shift funding from flight-proven components to novel technology that will be used on future missions, including the return of Americans to the moon during Artemis III. But the House mandates that the former programs maintain their historical levels of funding.

According to Casey Dreier, head of policy at the Planetary Society, that creates a roughly “half-billion-dollar hole” for the Lunar Gateway moon space station. To fill it, NASA will need to either redirect funds from other programs or significantly cut Gateway funding.

Artemis II and Artemis III have already been pushed to September 2025 and 2026, respectively, and NASA has hinted at delays to future missions. Earlier this year, it suddenly canceled development of the Viper lunar rover due to budget uncertainty.

“Future funding is clouded by the ever-declining federal discretionary budget from which NASA support is provided,” the report says.

Things may improve in 2026 when spending caps are lifted. However, NASA within the last year and change has lowered its budget projection for 2030 from about $30 billion to $28 billion.

Instant Gratification

NASA’s inefficiencies arise not just from its meager budget but also from how the agency uses it, the NASEM says.

The agency is often stretched thin by the sheer number of projects it pursues, causing setbacks to individual missions as in the case of Mars Sample Return or the James Webb Space Telescope.

Further, according to the report, many NASA leaders dismiss the need for long-term internal strategy, citing immense influence from Congress on its annual projects and budget. In short, the perception within NASA is that doing so would waste resources.

“Even planning for the advancing Artemis program lacks certain action-specific details associated with an architecture that is more complex and interdependent than Apollo,” the NASEM said.

But the lack of foresight by leadership results in unrealistic initial cost estimates, creating a domino effect that forces underfunded missions to pull money from other programs. The NASEM characterizes NASA’s internal research and development program, for example, as underfunded.

“The inevitable consequence of such a strategy is to erode those essential capabilities that led to the organization’s greatness in the first place and that underpin its future potential,” the report reads. “The profound negative consequences of this are felt far beyond the specific projects producing the delays and unanticipated funding demands.”

The NASEM recommended a total overhaul of NASA’s long-term mission planning process, including required “need dates” for capability and component needs. It also suggested that as responsibility shifts from NASA centers to specialized mission directorates, the agency should make sure its checks and balances are providing enough oversight.

An Eroding Base

Because NASA puts so much energy into its missions, the agency has neglected the engine that drives them: personnel and infrastructure.

Since 2017, only two NASA congressional authorization acts—which allocate funds from the Treasury Department and establish new programs and policy focuses—have been made law.  According to the report, “this inhibits the forecasting of workforce, infrastructure, and technology needs.”

On the infrastructure side, the NASEM recommended NASA work with Congress to create a revolving working capital fund (WCF) financed by the government and users of NASA facilities, similar to those for other federal departments. The agency could use the money to eliminate its maintenance backlog over the next decade and make continuous infrastructure enhancements.

Equally concerning is the agency’s workforce, which faces more competition for employment than ever before. Creating a commercial space ecosystem was a U.S. national policy goal for decades, and NASA has benefitted from working with private companies. These partnerships are necessary, the report argues, but verging on excessive.

Researchers contend that specialized, early phase mission work should be handled in-house, or NASA risks losing the talent that has propelled it thus far. Fixed-price or milestone-based contacts, such as the Artemis human landing system (HLS) agreements with SpaceX and Blue Origin, take agency personnel out of the picture. Many employees told researchers they would like more training or opportunities to hone their skills.

“In this case, NASA is more of a contract monitor than a technical organization capable of taking humanity into the solar system,” the NASEM said. “The concern is not only an erosion of ‘smart-buyer’ capability, but also of the capacity to invent and innovate.”

There is also the risk that a commercial provider exits the market or fails to deliver. A NASA inspector general report, for instance, blames contractor Boeing for certain delays associated with the Artemis program.

The NASEM directs NASA to invest in “early-stage, mission-critical technologies” that commercial firms have yet to crack, emphasize more hands-on work, and unearth new talent by targeting underrepresented demographics.

It could also seek to update the NASA Flexibility Act of 2004, which was implemented partially in response to the space shuttle Columbia accident and dictates what the agency can pay employees. By securing greater appointment and hiring authority, it could ease the burden of attracting and retaining talent.

Houston, Do We Have a Problem?

NASA’s budget woes have been well documented. The NASEM report, however, raises new concerns about how the agency uses what little it receives.

It’s not all NASA’s fault—the agency’s effort to scale back Mars Sample Return, for example, faces opposition from the House. If NASA must divert funding from other projects to support that mission, the blame would land squarely on Congress.

But the agency certainly isn’t helping matters. The neglect of long-term mission planning, despite lawmakers’ control over the budget, borders on ineptitude. Infrastructure and technology are dated. And private firms are snapping up talent faster than NASA can produce it.

Given the pressure the agency faces internally, from the government, and from its contractors, these issues are unlikely to resolve themselves without some serious effort. The hope is that the adoption of the Senate’s more favorable budget proposal, and the lifting of spending caps in 2026, could give it some much needed support. But NASA’s fortunes will also hinge on a reassessment of its priorities.

Like this story? We think you’ll also like the Future of FLYING newsletter sent every Thursday afternoon. Sign up now.

The post Report to Congress: Shortsighted, Aging NASA Faces Uncertain Future appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

Polaris Dawn, a five-day orbital mission purchased from the company by Jared Isaacman, the billionaire CEO of Shift4 Payments, is scheduled for lift off from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida no earlier than 3:38 a.m. EDT Tuesday morning. Backup launch opportunities are available at 5:23 a.m. EDT and 7:09 a.m. EDT, with the same approximately four-hour window open Wednesday morning.

Spaceflight enthusiasts can watch as SpaceX streams the launch and mission highlights—including the first attempt at a civilian spacewalk—live on its website, X account, and YouTube channel. Coverage will begin 3.5 hours before takeoff. The company and Isaacman’s Polaris Program will post mission updates on their websites and social media feeds.

What’s the Big Deal?

Polaris Dawn’s four-person crew comprises Isaacman and retired Air Force pilot Scott “Kidd” Poteet, as well as SpaceX engineers Sarah Gillis and Anna Menon, who will be the first company employees to actually reach space. They will hitch a ride on SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket and circle the Earth in a modified version of the firm’s Crew Dragon capsule.

The Dragon—which in 2021 carried the first all-civilian astronaut crew on the Inspiration4 mission, also purchased by Isaacman—required a few major tweaks to support the historic civilian spacewalk. Arguably the riskiest portion of the mission, viewers will be able to witness it in real time.

Only two astronauts will exit the capsule, using newly installed mobility aids to perform tests on SpaceX’s specially designed extravehicular activity (EVA) spacesuits. The spacewalk is scheduled to happen on day three of the flight, which would be Thursday if it launches as planned.

“It will look like we’re doing a little bit of a dance,” said Isaacman last month, “…[but] we’re going through a test matrix on the suit. And the idea is to learn as much as we possibly can about this suit and get it back to the engineers to inform future suit design evolutions.”

However, because Dragon lacks an airlock, all four crewmembers will be exposed to the vacuum of space. To prepare, NASA engineers “baked out” the capsule’s interior using what is essentially a giant oven. The objective was to burn off toxic chemicals that could be released when oxygen is vented from the cabin.

Plenty of work has gone into preparing the astronauts and their EVA suits too. In the two days leading up to the spacewalk, for example, crew members will perform what is known as a “prebreathe” to remove nitrogen bubbles that can form within body tissues, causing decompression sickness.

In addition, the astronauts have spent about 100 hours wearing their suits and thousands of hours preparing using simulators, vacuum chambers, and centrifuges. They’ve gone scuba diving and skydiving, flown fighter jets, and even summited Ecuador’s Cotopaxi, a nearly 20,000-foot peak.

Poteet, who flew Air Force fighters for nearly two decades and was a Thunderbird, said the regimen was “some of the most challenging training that I’ve ever experienced.”

Though it will not be live streamed, Polaris Dawn will also ascend to an orbital height not reached by humans since the Apollo 17 astronauts more than half a century ago. A few hours after launch on Tuesday, Dragon will fly to an apogee of 870 miles, passing through a portion of the treacherous Van Allen radiation belts.

The following day, live on orbit, Menon will read a children’s book she authored to her family and patients of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. Polaris Dawn in addition to being a research mission is a charitable endeavor, aiming to raise millions for St. Jude like Inspiration4 before it.

On the fourth day of the mission, there will also be a live demonstration of a special communication system in Dragon’s trunk, which uses laser beams to interact with Starlink satellites as they zip through space. SpaceX last month said the stream will be worth tuning into but did not provide specifics.

If all goes according to plan, Isaacman, Poteet, Gillis, and Menon will splash down at one of seven locations off the coast of Florida on Sunday.

Like this story? We think you’ll also like the Future of FLYING newsletter sent every Thursday afternoon. Sign up now.

The post Polaris Dawn Launch: What to Watch For appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

The spacecraft is scheduled to autonomously undock from the ISS no earlier than Friday, making way for a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft carrying NASA’s two-person Crew-9 astronaut rotation mission. Wilmore and Williams will hitch a ride home on that Dragon, rather than Starliner, after NASA determined the beleaguered Boeing spacecraft poses too much risk to return with crew as planned.

The space agency on Monday said the strange sounds have ceased and will have “no technical impact to the crew, Starliner, or station operations, including Starliner’s uncrewed undocking from the station.”

According to a conversation picked up by a Michigan-based meteorologist and first reported by Ars Technica, Wilmore on Saturday radioed NASA mission control at Johnson Space Center in Houston to report the odd sound.

“Got a question about Starliner,” he said. “There’s a strange noise coming through the speaker…I don’t know what’s making it.”

The astronaut asked mission control to listen in and see if it could determine the source of the noise. Moments later, Houston called back and Wilmore, now inside Starliner, held his microphone up to the spacecraft’s speakers, picking up the unusual sound.

“All right, Butch, that one came through,” mission control said. “It was kind of like a pulsing noise, almost like a sonar ping.”

The operator confirmed with Wilmore that there were no “other weird noises” coming from Starliner.

“I’ll do it one more time and let y’all scratch your heads and see if you can figure out what’s going on,” Wilmore replied, capturing the sound again. “Call us if you figure it out.”

Retired Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, who flew two space shuttle missions and served a stint as ISS commander, had an ominous response to the noise in a post on X.

“There are several noises I’d prefer not to hear inside my spaceship, including this one that @Boeing Starliner is now making,” Hadfield said.

NASA, though, offered a more mundane explanation for the pulsing sound.

“The feedback from the speaker was the result of an audio configuration between the space station and Starliner,” the space agency said. “The space station audio system is complex, allowing multiple spacecraft and modules to be interconnected, and it is common to experience noise and feedback. The crew is asked to contact mission control when they hear sounds originating in the comm system.”

This wouldn’t be the first time astronauts have encountered unusual noises in space. In 1969, for example, Apollo 10 astronauts reported hearing strange whistling “music” as they circled the moon. Apollo 11 pilot Michael Collins said he heard a similar “woo-woo sound” during his mission, which engineers have chalked up to radio interference.

More recently, Yang Liwei, the first Chinese man to reach space in 2003, recalled hearing what sounded like “someone knocking the body of the spaceship just as knocking an iron bucket with a wooden hammer.” Scientists now believe it was the result of air pressure changes.

It appears the noise heard aboard Starliner likewise has a rational explanation. Regardless, Wilmore and Williams will not need to concern themselves with it, as they are set to ride SpaceX’s Dragon back to Earth. The astronauts will return in February, eight months after they arrived at the space station.

Like this story? We think you’ll also like the Future of FLYING newsletter sent every Thursday afternoon. Sign up now.

The post NASA Explains Strange Noises Heard on Boeing Starliner appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

The FAA on Wednesday announced it will require an investigation into Falcon 9’s launch of 21 Starlink satellites that morning, which concluded with the booster tipping over into the Atlantic Ocean. Depending on the length of the investigation, two crewed SpaceX missions that will rely on the rocket—one for NASA, the other for a billionaire entrepreneur—could face setbacks.

“We’re just focused on recovery weather at this point. I think that is still [the] gate to our launch.” Jared Isaacman, the purchaser and commander of the latter mission, said in a post on X, seeming to dismiss concerns of a lengthy inquiry.

Wednesday’s flight was the first of two planned back-to-back Starlink launches, the second of which was called off. After its second stage successfully deployed the satellites into orbit, Falcon 9’s first stage appeared to suffer a collapsed landing leg when it touched down on SpaceX’s A Shortfall of Gravitas droneship, stationed several miles off the Florida coast. As flames erupted around it, the booster gave way and tumbled into the water. Beyond the loss of the booster, no injuries or damage were reported.

Still, the incident was enough to bring an FAA investigation, seemingly ending a streak of more than 250 successful SpaceX booster recoveries dating back to 2021. The first stage that flew Wednesday, B1062, completed a record-setting 23rd launch and landing. It played a crucial role for SpaceX, serving as the booster for Inspiration4, which sent the first all-civilian crew to orbit, and Ax-1, the first crewed mission to the International Space Station flown entirely by commercial operators.

“Losing a booster is always sad,” said Jon Edwards, vice president of Falcon launch vehicles at SpaceX, in a post on X. “Each one of them has a unique history and character. Thankfully this doesn’t happen often, due to the robust design and vigilance of the team.

An investigation does not necessarily mean a prolonged grounding. SpaceX will need to submit a final report, including any actions it needs to take to prevent the issue from happening again, for FAA approval.

But if the mishap did not jeopardize public safety or Falcon 9’s safety-critical systems, SpaceX could request the FAA make a public safety determination. If approved, that would allow launches to continue during the investigation. When Falcon 9 was grounded in July, SpaceX used this method to return to flight in just two weeks.

“We are working as hard as we can to thoroughly understand root cause and get corrective actions in place ASAP,” Edwards said on X. “One thing we do know though is this was purely a recovery issue and posed no threat to primary mission or public safety.”

SpaceX is relying on Falcon 9 to launch Isaacman and three other crewmembers, including the first company employees to fly to space, on the historic Polaris Dawn mission. Originally scheduled for this week but delayed due to weather concerns and a small helium leak, the five-day mission will feature the first attempt at a civilian spacewalk. It also aims to orbit at a higher altitude than humans have reached since Apollo 17 more than half a century ago.

Complicating matters somewhat is that Launch Complex 39-A at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, which SpaceX will use for Polaris Dawn, is needed by NASA for the Europa Clipper mission scheduled for October 10. The company will also use Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station to launch Crew-9 to the ISS, which itself could be delayed by the investigation.

Unlike other Commercial Crew rotation missions SpaceX has flown for NASA, Crew-9 will have two astronauts rather than four to accommodate Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, who have been at the ISS since June on Boeing Starliner’s inaugural crew flight test (CFT). The space agency over the weekend opted to bring home the astronauts on SpaceX’s Dragon capsule rather than Starliner, making Falcon 9 an important piece of the operation.

Any delay to Crew-9 could further force NASA to come up with a new plan for Starliner. The capsule needs to depart the space station before Crew-9 launches in order to make way for Dragon.

Like this story? We think you’ll also like the Future of FLYING newsletter sent every Thursday afternoon. Sign up now.

The post SpaceX Falcon 9 Rocket Grounded Amid Upcoming Human Spaceflight Missions appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

The semireusable vessel to the ISS is in the midst of its inaugural crew flight test (CFT) for NASA, which was planned as an eight-day visit to the orbital laboratory but has stretched for months. Officials over the weekend determined the spacecraft’s ongoing helium leaks and thruster issues pose too much risk for the mission to be completed with crew.

Instead, Wilmore and Williams will hitch a ride on SpaceX’s Crew Dragon, which will launch to the ISS on the Crew-9 mission scheduled for September 24. They’ll work alongside the Crew-9 astronauts during their six-month stay, coming home in February—eight months after they left.

The mission was intended to be Starliner’s final test flight before NASA certifies it for routine ISS missions.

“Spaceflight is risky, even at its safest and most routine,” said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson during an update at Johnson Space Center in Houston on Saturday. “A test flight, by nature, is neither safe nor routine. The decision to keep Butch and Suni aboard the International Space Station and bring Boeing’s Starliner home uncrewed is the result of our commitment to safety: our core value and our North Star.”

Both Wilmore and Williams are seasoned astronauts, having completed monthslong spaceflight missions in the past. They’ll have plenty of supplies for their extended stay. NASA launched an ISS commercial resupply mission this month and has another scheduled for October.

Norm Knight, director of flight operations for NASA, said he spoke to the crewmembers on Saturday and that they support the decision to return in February. During their lone Earth-to-orbit call in July, the astronauts said they are “having a great time” on the space station.

To make room for Wilmore and Williams, SpaceX’s Crew-9 will fly with two astronauts rather than the typical four. NASA is working to reconfigure Dragon’s seats and adjust the mission manifest to accommodate additional supplies, personal items, and spacesuits for the Starliner crew.

Before Crew-9 launches, Starliner—which is capable of flying autonomously—must undock and make a controlled reentry and landing in the New Mexico desert, freeing up a docking port for Dragon. NASA officials will conduct a flight readiness review to determine when that will happen.

“We also will continue to gather more data about Starliner during the uncrewed return and improve the system for future flights to the space station,” said Ken Bowersox, associate administrator of NASA’s space operations mission directorate.

Nelson on Saturday said he spoke to newly anointed Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg, who assured him the company would finish out its $4.2 billion contract to develop Starliner and fly two to six commercial ISS missions. The manufacturer has already spent $1.6 billion out of pocket to cover delays and cost overruns on the fixed-price agreement.

“We continue to focus, first and foremost, on the safety of the crew and spacecraft,” Boeing said in a statement. “We are executing the mission as determined by NASA, and we are preparing the spacecraft for a safe and successful uncrewed return.”

What Went Wrong?

Technical problems and setbacks are nothing new for the Starliner program, which has been hampered by faulty thrusters, software and communications issues, corroded valves, and even flammable tape Boeing installed in the cockpit.

NASA in 2014 awarded contracts to Boeing and SpaceX, which received $2.6 billion, to build the vehicles that would comprise its Commercial Crew astronaut rotation program in a bid to reduce its reliance on Russian Soyuz spacecraft. The agency is seeking two vehicles so that each can serve as a backup for the other.

Since then, though, SpaceX has flown eight Commercial Crew missions, while Boeing has yet to complete a crewed flight test.

“All of us really wanted to complete the test flight with crew, and I think unanimously we’re disappointed not to be able to do that,” Bowersox said of the Starliner CFT.

NASA and Boeing knew about a helium leak on Starliner’s service module—the spacecraft’s expendable component—prior to the mission but took a calculated risk in authorizing it. During the vehicle’s approach to the ISS on June 6, crews discovered four more leaks, which officials said have stabilized.

The bigger issue lies with the service module’s reaction control system (RCS) thrusters, made by Boeing contractor Aerojet Rocketdyne. During Starliner’s deorbit burn, they will be required to align the spacecraft with its landing spot. Five of these thrusters failed to fire at full strength during its rendezvous with the ISS. All but one of them, which has been deactivated, are back to normal after testing, NASA said.

But the agency has struggled to trace the root cause of the problem. It delayed Crew-9 in order to perform ground testing at White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico, putting an identical RCS thruster through the same maneuvers that affected Starliner on orbit.

Throughout the process, officials insisted that Starliner—not Dragon—would be the astronauts’ ride home. But their tone changed in August, when engineers theorized that extreme heat from the thrusters caused a seal to expand, blocking the flow of propellant and dimming the flames.

“We are clearly operating this thruster at a higher temperature at times than it was designed for,” said Steve Stich, manager of NASA’s Commercial Crew program.

The thruster issue ultimately traces back to a design flaw with the “doghouses” that insulate the hardware from space. These pods—which each house several thrusters—are retaining too much heat during more intense maneuvers. Engineers thought they had addressed the issue following Starliner’s second uncrewed test flight, which reached the ISS but suffered similar RCS thruster problems.

“We thought, obviously, we had done enough analysis to show that the thrusters would be within the temperatures that they were qualified for,” said Stich. “Clearly, there were some misses in qualification.”

Officials on Saturday concluded, unanimously, that there is enough risk of the problem resurfacing during the deorbit burn to pivot to Dragon. But it wasn’t without pushback from Boeing, which according to Bowersox held “tense discussions” with NASA.

“We view the data and the uncertainty that’s there differently than Boeing does,” said Jim Free, associate administrator of NASA.

Boeing officials including Mark Nappi, vice president and manager of the company’s Commercial Crew program, repeatedly downplayed the severity of the thruster issues over the past two months. On August 2, the firm even made a blog post reiterating its confidence in Starliner and summarizing the testing that had been performed.

Ultimately, though, NASA said it has learned from the missteps of the space shuttle Columbia and Challenger catastrophes and decided to err on the side of caution.

“We lost two space shuttles as a result of there not being a culture in which information could come forward,” said Nelson. “We have been very solicitous of all of our employees that if you have some objection, you come forward.”

What’s Next?

Bringing Starliner home uncrewed undoubtedly deals a blow to Boeing, despite officials’ assurance that the capsule will soon fly again. Nelson said he is “100 percent certain” the spacecraft will carry crew on future missions.

“Starliner is a very capable spacecraft and, ultimately, this comes down to needing a higher level of certainty to perform a crewed return,” said Stich.

When those missions will launch, however, is anyone’s guess. The spacecraft’s debut service mission, Starliner-1, is scheduled for August 2025 after its initial February window was given to SpaceX’s Crew-10. But that date could be jeopardized by further NASA requirements, including—potentially—another CFT.

Officials on Saturday did not commit to that. But Stich in July said NASA and Boeing “understand it’s going to take a little bit longer” to certify the spacecraft than previously thought. Officials this month said they were unsure whether NASA would classify the CFT as a mishap, which would require a more thorough investigation.

Any delay could jeopardize Starliner’s ability to fulfill its contract before the ISS is retired by NASA and SpaceX at the end of the decade. Per Ars Technica, the agency has only placed firm orders for three missions and can purchase individual flights from Boeing or SpaceX as needed.

Keeping the program on track will likely come down to Boeing, which is on the hook for any redesigns required to address Starliner’s helium leaks and faulty thrusters.

“They’ve spent ‘X.’ Will they spend ‘Y’ to get to where Boeing Starliner becomes a regular part of our crew rotation?” said Nelson. “I don’t have the answer to that, nor do I think we would have the answer now.”

Like this story? We think you’ll also like the Future of FLYING newsletter sent every Thursday afternoon. Sign up now.

The post SpaceX—Not Boeing—Will Return Starliner Astronauts After Monthslong Mission appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

The jets are owned by billionaire entrepreneur and Polaris Dawn commander Jared Isaacman, who purchased the five-day orbital mission and two other private astronaut flights from SpaceX in 2022. Among other feats, Polaris Dawn will ascend to orbital heights not reached since the Apollo 17 astronauts in 1972 and feature the first attempt at a commercial spacewalk.

“The idea is to develop and test new technology and operations in furtherance of SpaceX’s bold vision to enable humankind to journey among the stars,” Isaacman said during a mission overview briefing on Monday.

But with those feats comes a degree of risk. At their apex, the astronauts will travel through a portion of the hazardous Van Allen radiation belts. And because the Dragon spacecraft that will carry the crew has no airlock, all four astronauts will be exposed to the vacuum of space during the historic spacewalk.

Polaris Dawn is scheduled to launch no earlier than 3:38 a.m. EDT on Monday within a four-hour window from KSC’s Launch Complex 39-A. Earlier this week, the Dragon capsule was transported to the pad, where teams are mating it with a Falcon 9 booster that will make its fourth flight.

Joining Isaacman will be mission pilot Scott “Kidd” Poteet, a longtime friend and coworker of the Shift4 Payments CEO. Poteet served as mission director for Inspiration4, a 2021 orbital mission—also purchased from SpaceX by Isaacman—that featured the first all-civilian crew.

Accompanying them will be the first SpaceX employees to actually fly to space—mission specialists Sarah Gillis and Anna Menon. Gillis, a SpaceX engineer and astronaut trainer, has prepared several NASA crews that have reached the final frontier and was Isaacman’s instructor for Inspiration4. Menon, the company’s lead space operations engineer, will also serve as Polaris Dawn’s medical officer.

This week, crewmembers will conduct a refresher on the mission’s nearly 40 planned experiments, dry dress rehearsal, and launch readiness review. They will spend a maximum of five days orbiting the Earth before splashing down at one of seven locations off the coast of Florida.

Great Heights

Polaris Dawn will waste no time achieving its objectives, beginning with a historic climb on day one.

Hitching a ride on Falcon 9, Dragon will reach space in about 10 minutes and within hours will begin to pass through the inner regions of the Van Allen Belts—a treacherous zone where the risk of damage from radiation is high.

“The Earth’s magnetosphere traps the high energy radiation particles and shields the Earth from the solar storms and the constantly streaming solar wind that can damage technology as well as people living on Earth,” according to NASA. “These trapped particles form two belts of radiation, known as the Van Allen Belts, that surround the Earth like enormous donuts.”

Dragon will ascend to an oval orbit with an apogee of 870 miles, more than three times higher than the International Space Station. It would be the highest orbital altitude reached by humans in half a century.

“Generally speaking, vehicles don’t like radiation, so that’s why we’re going to stay there for the shortest amount of time that’s necessary to gather the data we want,” said Isaacman.

In that time, however, the crew will perform plenty of experiments, leveraging the unique high-radiation environment to potentially learn from it. The Polaris program and SpaceX have partnered with more than 30 institutions around the world to perform the research, which will focus largely on human health.

“We are born into 1G,” said Menon. “When you go into 0G, whether it’s for five days or a nine-month trip to Mars, things change. You have bone density loss, you have vision changes, you have severe motion sickness, and we don’t have answers for all of that.”

To search for them, the astronauts will don special contact lenses that measure the pressure inside of their eyes and will test ways to reduce the disorientation experienced when returning to Earth, for example.

Research will continue throughout the mission. On the fourth day, the crew will test out a specially designed communication system in Dragon’s trunk, which will use laser beams to communicate with SpaceX Starlink satellites as they zip through space. According to Gillis, the demonstration will be livestreamed and worth tuning into, though she did not get into specifics.

Polaris Dawn is also a charitable endeavor, aiming to raise money for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. Menon, for example, will debut a children’s book she wrote, the proceeds for which will go to cancer research, during day two of the flight. The SpaceX engineer said the company has installed Starlink terminals at hospitals nationwide to support remote medicine capabilities.

And in a fundraising partnership with Doritos, Polaris Dawn’s cargo will include a container of chips. According to its website, the initiative has raised $500,000. But there won’t be any sticky fingers—the classic Doritos “dust” has been replaced by a special oil-based coating designed to retain flavor.

Isaacman on Monday said Polaris Dawn has already raised “millions” for St. Jude and that he plans to continue the partnership for the Polaris II and Polaris III missions. Inspiration4 raised more than a quarter of a billion for the charity.

Suit Up

Reaching the Van Allen Belts would be a huge feat. But that’s arguably the second-most important—and risky—mission objective.

On the third day of the flight, two of the astronauts will don specially designed SpaceX extravehicular activity (EVA) spacesuits and exit Dragon. They will remain attached to the spacecraft—at one point by just their feet—using mobility aids to maneuver around. The vehicle will be oriented to shield the crew from direct sunlight.

The entire process, from venting to repressurization, will take about two hours and will be livestreamed. Each astronaut will spend 15 to 20 minutes outside the capsule.

“It will look like we’re doing a little bit of a dance,” said Isaacman, “…[but] we’re going through a test matrix on the suit. And the idea is to learn as much as we possibly can about this suit and get it back to the engineers to inform future suit design evolutions.”

But there’s a catch: Dragon does not have an airlock, which means all four crewmembers will be exposed to the vacuum of space.

To remedy this, they will perform a process known as “pre-breathing” beginning just one hour after reaching orbit. The procedure will acclimate the astronauts to a low-pressure environment by gradually reducing the pressure inside the capsule. According to Menon, the idea is to “slowly pull nitrogen out of our body and reduce our risk of decompression sickness.”

On the day of the spacewalk, their spacesuits will be pressurized with 100 percent oxygen for a final pre-breathe. The entire process will take about 45 hours.

Per Isaacman, the spacewalk portion of Polaris Dawn took up the bulk of mission planning, in part due to the development of SpaceX’s EVA suits.

The suits are an evolution of the company’s current apparel, which is designed to be worn only inside Dragon. The upgraded digs feature added mobility and materials pulled from Falcon 9’s trunk and interstage. A 3D-printed helmet includes a heads-up display, which shows spacesuit pressure, temperature, and humidity, as well as a clock to track the astronauts’ time in the void. The suit’s temperature can even be controlled using a dial.

“You might think that we would be extremely cold out in the vacuum of space, and actually we’re more concerned about being too warm,” said Menon.

The suits have undergone an “incredibly expensive testing campaign” with the crew, which has spent about 100 hours wearing them. Because the hardware is “constantly evolving,” per Menon, it could not be tested in a pool. Instead, the astronauts used special harnesses to simulate weightlessness and wore heavy down suits—the kind you’d need at the top of Mount Everest—over their EVA suits.

“We’re really trying to create an environment that doesn’t have convection, looking at thermals, looking at what we’ll actually experience in these suits,” said Menon. “We’ve covered everything from lifecycle testing, pressure testing, [micrometeoroid and orbital debris] testing, extreme hot and cold testing, [and] an entire campaign on [electrostatic discharge] and flammability testing.”

That level of rigor extended to the Dragon capsule, which itself required a few key modifications for the mission. SpaceX added a nitrogen repressurization system, for example, and made upgrades to the spacecraft’s environmental sensors and life support system.

“This includes adding a lot more oxygen to the spacecraft so we can feed oxygen to four suits through umbilicals for the full duration of the spacewalk,” said Menon.

Outside Dragon’s hatch, engineers installed what SpaceX calls the Skywalker, a structure that will help the astronauts find their footing in zero gravity. Atop the Skywalker is a new camera that will capture footage of the spacewalk. Handholds and footholds were added to the capsule’s interior.

In addition, all of that hardware has been “baked out” in a thermal vacuum chamber, Menon said, to burn off chemicals that could produce toxic gas when the capsule is vented.

Thousands of Hours

The astronauts have already prepared extensively for the spacewalk. They recently walked through the entire prebreathe process and venting and repressurization sequence, for example, inside the vacuum chamber at Johnson Space Center.

But that was only the tip of the iceberg.

“I can tell you without a doubt this has been some of the most challenging training that I’ve ever experienced, and I could not imagine a more qualified crew than these three individuals,” said Poteet, a retired U.S. Air Force fighter pilot and member of the Thunderbirds.

The astronauts performed zero-gravity flights in the vacuum chamber, trained in a centrifuge to experience g-forces, and spent time in an altitude chamber to get familiar with symptoms of hypoxia—a condition caused by low oxygen levels in the body. The crew also used a pressure chamber to practice many of the experiments they will conduct in space back on Earth. Gillis and Menon underwent medical training at partner hospitals to be qualified to care for the team.

Each crewmember also spent about 2,000 hours in a simulator, poring over spacecraft and system manuals, communication methods, crew resource management, and contingency scenarios.

“To put this into perspective, I flew fighters for 20 years—I accomplished about 1,500 hours in the simulator training for combat,” said Poteet.

Another key component of training was, as Poteet put it, “getting comfortable in uncomfortable scenarios.” Over the past few years, the crew has gone scuba diving and skydiving, flown fighter jets, and even summited Cotopaxi in Ecuador, a nearly 20,000-foot peak.

“When it’s a multiday journey to get to the summit, you’re dehydrated, you’re hungry, you’re grouchy…it sucks,” said Poteet. “And you learn a lot about yourself under this stressful environment, and you learn a lot about each other.”

‘The 737 for Human Spaceflight’

Though it was purchased by an outside stakeholder, Polaris Dawn has some major implications for SpaceX.

For one, it will be the company’s first mission with crew since Falcon 9 was grounded by the FAA in July. The rocket was quickly cleared for a return to action and has since completed several Starlink launches.

But the mission’s success—or lack thereof—could also inform the timeline of SpaceX’s Starship, the largest and most powerful rocket ever built.

Polaris Dawn is the first of three missions purchased by Isaacman. Little is known about the second, Polaris II, which will also use Dragon and Falcon 9. But Polaris III is intended to be the debut human spaceflight mission for Starship, which so far has completed four orbital test flights.

“It could very well be the [Boeing] 737 for human spaceflight someday,” said Isaacman. “But it’ll certainly be the vehicle that will return humans to the moon and then on to Mars and beyond.”

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has grand ambitions for Starship, such as ferrying humans to Mars in order to create a colony. But they will hinge on the company remaining on schedule—and, hopefully, learning as much as possible about its EVA spacesuits during Polaris Dawn.

Within one week of Dragon’s splashdown, the firm plans to host a Polaris Dawn mission debrief and question-and-answer session on X Spaces.

Like this story? We think you’ll also like the Future of FLYING newsletter sent every Thursday afternoon. Sign up now.

The post Polaris Dawn Is SpaceX’s Most Experimental—and Risky—Human Spaceflight Yet appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

The semireusable space capsule is in the middle of its inaugural crewed flight test (CFT), a test mission that was intended to last around eight days but could be stretched to eight months if NASA decides against flying it home with crew. In that case, SpaceX’s Crew Dragon, which is scheduled to fly another crew of astronauts to the ISS on September 24, would return Williams and Wilmore in February, the space agency said last week.

Starliner was intended to fly the astronauts to the ISS for a few days of research and evaluations before returning them to Earth a few days later. But on its way to the orbital laboratory, NASA identified five reaction control system (RCS) thrusters on the capsule’s service module—an expendable component—that did not fire at full strength.

The decision was made to keep Starliner docked to the space station while NASA and Boeing crews performed testing and data analysis on the ground at White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico, as well as a few hot fire tests of the thrusters on orbit.

Officials have said that the machinery is now working at or near expected levels, but engineers are still working to determine what caused the issue and ensure it doesn’t reappear on the return trip. NASA has brought in propulsion experts from different branches, including the Glenn Research Center, Goddard Space Flight Center, and Jet Propulsion Laboratory, to gather outside opinions.

As a result, Starliner’s return has been delayed several times, most recently after NASA announced that a flight readiness review would be pushed from this week to next. That meeting will pull together stakeholders from across the agency in order to make a final decision on how to return the crew. If stakeholders cannot settle on a plan, the decision will be kicked up the ladder to NASA Associate Administrator Jim Free or Administrator Bill Nelson.

Now, according to Ken Bowersox, associate administrator of the agency’s Space Operations Mission Directorate, the flight readiness review will take place either at the end of next week or the start of the following.

According to NASA chief astronaut Joe Acaba, Wilmore and Williams will have to abide by whatever stakeholders decide.

“They will do what we ask them to do,” Acaba said Wednesday. “This is not really a preference thing. They are going to wait for us to analyze the data and come up with a decision.”

Absent from Wednesday’s briefing were officials from Boeing, but officials said company representatives have been involved in key meetings and data analysis.

If NASA opts to use SpaceX’s Dragon, it could send the spacecraft up with two crewmembers instead of four, as planned, to leave room for the astronauts to hitch a ride when the mission concludes in February.

Like this story? We think you’ll also like the Future of FLYING newsletter sent every Thursday afternoon. Sign up now.

The post NASA Sets Tentative End-of-Month Deadline on Starliner Decision appeared first on FLYING Magazine.