Development of the Commercial Crew Program


Development of the Commercial Crew Program began in the second round of the program, which was rescoped from a smaller technology development program for human spaceflight to a competitive development program that would produce the spacecraft to be used to provide crew transportation services to and from the International Space Station. To implement the program, NASA awarded a series of competitive fixed-price contracts to private vendors starting in 2011. Operational contracts to fly astronauts were awarded in September 2014 to SpaceX and Boeing, and NASA expected each company to complete development and achieve crew rating in 2017. Each company performed an uncrewed orbital test flight in 2019.
SpaceX's Crew Dragon Demo-1 2019 flight of Dragon 2 arrived at the International Space Station in March 2019 and returned via splashdown in the Atlantic Ocean. After completion of its test series, a Crew Dragon spacecraft made its first operational Commercial Crew Program flight, SpaceX Crew-1. The flight launched on November 16, 2020. SpaceX has completed seven successful CCP flights with another, SpaceX Crew-8, currently in progress. It is contracted with NASA for fourteen operational flights total to the ISS.
The 2019 Boeing Orbital Flight Test of the CST-100 Starliner spacecraft failed to reach the ISS in December 2019. The second test flight, Boeing Orbital Flight Test 2, occurred successfully in May 2022. Pending completion of its demonstration flights, Boeing is contracted to supply six operational flights to the ISS. The first group of astronauts was announced on August 3, 2018. The first Starliner crewed flight test launched on June 5, 2024. Starliner successfully docked with the station on June 6, 2024, after suffering several helium leaks and thruster malfunctions. Due to these issues Starliner's return to earth was delayed initially to June 26, 2024, then indefinitely. On August 24, 2024 NASA administrator Bill Nelson made the decision to send the Starliner crew back home on SpaceX's Crew Dragon.

Requirements

Key high-level requirements for the Commercial Crew vehicles include:
  • Safely deliver and return four crew members and their equipment to the International Space Station
  • Provide assured crew return in the event of an emergency
  • Serve as a 24-hour safe haven in the event of an emergency
  • Capable of remaining docked to the station for 210 days

    Background

After the retirement of STS in 2011 and the cancellation of the Constellation program, NASA had no domestic vehicles capable of launching astronauts to space. Artemis, NASA's next major human spaceflight initiative, was scheduled to launch an uncrewed qualification flight in 2016, with an Orion spacecraft atop a Space Launch System booster. The NASA had no human-qualified spacecraft available, and in any event SLS/Orion would be too expensive for routine flights to the ISS. In the meantime, NASA continued to send astronauts to the ISS on Soyuz spacecraft seats purchased from Russia. The price varied over time, with the batch of seats from 2016 to 2017 costing $70.7 million per passenger per flight. Artemis continued to slip, with the first uncrewed test flight scheduled for 2022.

Development Program

The CCDev program was initiated to develop safe and reliable commercial ISS crew launch capabilities to replace the Soyuz flights. CCDev followed Commercial Orbital Transportation Services, an ISS commercial cargo program. CCDev contracts were issued for fixed-price, pay-for-performance milestones. CCDev was implemented in several phases. CCDev 1 contracts were for development of concepts and technologies. CCDev 2 contracts were for actual vehicle designs. CCiCap contracts were for designs of complete end-to-end crew transportation hardware and services. CPC phase 1 contracts were for the development of a full certification plan. Finally CCtCap contracts were awarded for actual demonstration of crewed transportation services, which included development, testing, and production of the required hardware followed by operational flights to the ISS.

CCDev 1

Commercial Crew Development consisted of $50 million awarded in 2010 to five US companies to develop human spaceflight concepts and technologies. NASA awarded development funds to five companies under CCDev 1:
On April 18, 2011, NASA awarded nearly $270 million to four companies for developing U.S. vehicles that could fly astronauts after the Space Shuttle fleet's retirement. Funded proposals:
  • Blue Origin: $22 million. Technologies in support of a biconic nose cone design orbital vehicle, including launch abort system liquid oxygen/liquid hydrogen engines.
  • Sierra Nevada Corporation: $80 million. Dream Chaser
  • SpaceX: $75 million. Dragon 2 integrated launch abort system
  • Boeing: $92.3 million. Additional CST-100 Starliner development
Proposals selected without NASA funding:
  • United Launch Alliance: extend development work on human-rating the Atlas V
  • Alliant Techsystems and Astrium proposed development of Liberty. NASA was to share expertise and technology.
  • Excalibur Almaz Inc. was developing a crewed system with modernized Soviet-era hardware intended for tourism flights to orbit. An unfunded Space Act Agreement to establish a framework to further develop EAI's spacecraft concept for low Earth orbit crew transportation.
Proposals not selected:
  • Orbital Sciences proposed the Prometheus lifting-body spaceplane vehicle
  • Paragon Space Development Corporation proposed additional development of the Commercial Crew Transport-Air Revitalization System.
  • t/Space proposed a reusable eight-person crew or cargo transfer spacecraft
  • United Space Alliance proposed to commercially fly the two remaining Space Shuttle vehicles.

    CCiCap

Commercial Crew integrated Capability was originally called CCDev 3. For this phase of the program, NASA wanted proposals to be complete, end-to-end concepts of operation, including spacecraft, launch vehicles, launch services, ground and mission operations, and recovery. In September 2011, NASA released a draft request for proposals. The final RFP was released on February 7, 2012, with proposals due on March 23, 2012. The funded Space Act Agreements were awarded on August 3, 2012, and amended on August 15, 2013.
The selected proposals were announced August 3, 2012:
  • Sierra Nevada Corporation: $212.5 million. Dream Chaser/Atlas V
  • SpaceX: $440 million. Dragon 2/Falcon 9
  • Boeing: $460 million. CST-100 Starliner/Atlas V

    CPC phase 1

The first phase of the Certification Products Contract involved the development of a certification plan with engineering standards, tests, and analyses. Winners of funding of phase 1 of the CPC, announced on December 10, 2012, were:
  • Sierra Nevada Corporation: $10 million
  • SpaceX: $9.6 million
  • Boeing: $9.9 million

    CCtCap – crew flights awarded

The Commercial Crew Transportation Capability is the second phase of the CPC and included the final development, testing and verifications to allow crewed demonstration flights to the ISS. NASA issued the draft CCtCap contract's Request For Proposals on July 19, 2013, with a response date of August 15, 2013. On September 16, 2014, NASA announced that Boeing and SpaceX had received contracts to provide crewed launch services to the ISS. Boeing could receive up to US$4.2 billion, while SpaceX could receive up to US$2.6 billion. Dragon was the less expensive proposal, but NASA's William H. Gerstenmaier considered the Boeing Starliner proposal the stronger of the two. In November 2019 NASA published a first cost per seat estimate: US$55 million for SpaceX's Dragon and US$90 million for Boeing's Starliner. Boeing was also granted an additional $287.2 million above the fixed price contract. Seats on Soyuz had an average cost of US$80 million. However, adjusting for the additional cargo carried by Boeing's Starliner inside its crew capsule, the adjusted cost per seat figure is approximately $70 million, which is still higher than SpaceX's Crew Dragon even if the Dragon does not carry the equivalent of a fifth passenger in cargo. Both the CST-100 Starliner and Crew Dragon were to fly an uncrewed flight, then a crewed certification flight, then up to six operational flights to the ISS.

Timeline

Ongoing delays

The first flight of the Commercial Crew Program was planned to occur in 2015, but insufficient funding caused delays. As the spacecraft entered the testing and production phase, technical issues also caused delays, especially the parachute system, propulsion, and the launch abort system of both capsules.

Starliner 2018 valve issue

In July 2018, a test anomaly was reported in which there was a hypergolic propellant leak due to several faulty abort system valves. Consequentially, the first unpiloted orbital mission was delayed to April 2019, and the first crew launch rescheduled to August 2019. In March 2019, Reuters reported these test flights had been delayed by at least three months, and in April 2019 Boeing announced that the unpiloted orbital mission was scheduled for August 2019.

Crew Dragon explosion

On April 20, 2019, an issue arose during a static fire test of Crew Dragon. The accident destroyed the capsule which was planned to be used for the In-Flight Abort Test. SpaceX confirmed that the capsule exploded. NASA stated that the explosion would delay the planned in-flight abort and crewed orbital tests.