A stripped
down version of NASA's future spaceship designed by a Nevada-based company could
be ready as soon as 2013, according to the Bigelow Aerospace, the private company
proposing to build it.
A Bigelow
official flew to Denver in July to privately brief a White House-charted panel
on the suggested design based on the planned Orion Crew
Exploration Vehicle, which will carry passengers to and from low Earth
orbit.
Such a
system is crucial to Bigelow's plans for deploying Sundancer, an inflatable space
station module the North Las Vegas, Nev.-based firm is building based on
NASA's Transhab design. In search of the means to transport paying passengers
to Sundancer, Bigelow has spent the past two years working with Denver-based
United Launch Alliance to study a human-rated version of the Atlas
5 rocket.
"Orion
Lite"
But it was
not until last month that Bigelow quietly unveiled the "Orion Lite"
concept in a private briefing to former Lockheed Martin Chief Executive Norm
Augustine and his White House-charted committee tasked in May with developing a
range of options for an affordable and sustainable U.S. human spaceflight
program.
Bigelow's
crew capsule design is modeled on the Orion vehicle that Lockheed Martin — one
of United Launch Alliance's corporate parents — is developing for NASA.
In a July
30 interview with Space News, Mike Gold, director of Bigelow's
Washington office, said he believes a low Earth-orbit optimized version of
Orion could be ready to launch atop a human-rated
version of the Atlas 5 within three or four years — much sooner than NASA's
discredited March 2015 target for the first crewed launch of Orion and its Ares
I rocket.
Gold said
the Bigelow capsule would have the same outer mold line as NASA's 16-foot (5-meter)
wide Orion and possibly the same internal pressure vessel, but little else in
common.
Lighter
Capsule
For
starters, NASA expects the lunar-capable Orion crew capsule and
propellant-laden service module to weigh well in excess of about 40,000 pounds (20,000
kg). Gold would not provide weight or cost estimates for Bigelow's Orion Lite
concept, but said the envisioned vehicle would be light enough to launch atop an
Atlas 5 with a twin-engine Centaur upper stage but no strap-on solid-rocket
boosters. This configuration, known as the 402, is capable of lofting 27,557 pounds
(12,500 kg) into low Earth orbit.
Gold said
the Bigelow capsule would also be capable of launching atop the Falcon 9 rocket
Hawthorne, Calif.-based Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) hopes to debut
this year.
"I don't
think there's any question that a commercial capsule can be constructed, tested
and launched years before the existing Orion plan will come together, if it
ever does," Gold said. "We're moving beyond Orion-Ares at this point."
A start-up
venture founded in the late 1990s by real estate mogul Robert Bigelow, the
company currently has two subscale expandable
space modules in orbit. The privately financed Genesis 1 and Genesis 2
modules were launched in 2006 and 2007, respectively, from Russia aboard Dnepr
rockets.
A
combination of rising Russian launch prices and the success of Genesis 1 and
Genesis 2 compelled the company to skip the launch of additional subscale
demonstrators and accelerate development of Sundancer, a six-person space station
that could grow to accommodate 15.
"We have a
history of leveraging existing technology as demonstrated by the Dnepr
missions, and utilizing a commercial capsule simply follows in the pragmatic
path we have begun upon," Gold said. "We will soon be moving forward with
solicitations focused on the airframe and getting quotes from various
subcontractors."
Gold would
not say whether Orion prime contractor Lockheed Martin has or will have any
involvement in Orion Lite. Lockheed Martin spokeswoman Joan Underwood did not
return multiple phone calls seeking comment by press time. But industry and
government sources familiar with the effort, said Lockheed has helped Bigelow
with the concept.
Low
Earth orbit only
From the
outside, the full-size mockup built for Bigelow appears to be a clone of NASA's
Orion capsule adorned with the Bigelow logo.
But while
NASA's Orion is intended to carry up to six people to the International Space Station
and four to the Moon, Gold said Bigelow's commercial variant will accommodate a
minimum of seven passengers because it is intended for low Earth-orbit missions
only. That eliminates the need for bulky propellant tanks, extremely robust
heat shields and other lunar-driven requirements that add mass to NASA's Orion
design.
"This will
be meant for relatively short trips to and back, so there's a difference in
hang-time," he said. "It's not intended to operate independently for extended
periods, which Orion is."
One of the
biggest deviations from NASA's Orion design involves the vehicle's landing
system. Whereas NASA plans call for Orion to make an Apollo-style splashdown in
the ocean, Bigelow is considering midair retrieval as a safer and more
economical means to land the spacecraft following atmospheric re-entry.
"Air-capture
is a strategy that has been implemented many times in the past, but never done
at weights as high as a capsule," Gold said.
Midair
capture was used by the military during World War II to recover gliders and
during the 1960s to catch film canisters dropped from Corona spy satellites
orbiting overhead.
More
recently, NASA attempted a midair capture of a Genesis solar-sample return
capsule in 2004, but a parachute failure prevented the awaiting helicopter from
making the catch. In 2007, Houston-based Spacehab, now Astrotech, dropped a
mockup of a space station cargo module from a helicopter and subsequently
recaptured it.
Private
space endeavors
While the
Bigelow capsule is in the pre-system design review stage, industry sources
familiar with the effort say much of the work Lockheed Martin has done on Orion
can be readily applied to Orion Lite.
In
addition, sources said, Lockheed Martin has a number of preflight Orion
capsules planned for testing purposes that could be turned into flight vehicles
for Bigelow.
Bigelow is
not the only private space company venturing into the realm of manned
spaceflight: SpaceX plans to fit at least seven crewmembers aboard its Dragon
cargo and crew capsule designed for trips to and from the space station.
Gold said
Bigelow wants to see SpaceX succeed with Falcon 9 and Dragon.
"However,
we would be foolish to depend completely on one capsule provider or any single
launch system," Gold said. "Therefore, it's vital from both a practical and
business perspective to ensure that SpaceX and Dragon aren't the only options
available to us, hence the need for another capsule."
advertisement
