The selectees for CCDev2 awards are:

+ Blue Origin, Kent, Wash., $22 million

+ Sierra Nevada Corporation, Louisville, Colo., $80 million

+ Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX), Hawthorne, Calif., $75 million

+ The Boeing Company, Houston, $92.3 million

"We're committed to safely transporting U.S. astronauts on American-made spacecraft and ending the outsourcing of this work to foreign governments," NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said.

"These agreements are significant milestones in NASA's plans to take advantage of American ingenuity to get to low-Earth orbit, so we can concentrate our resources on deep space exploration."

The goal of CCDev2 is to accelerate the availability of U.S. commercial crew transportation capabilities and reduce the gap in American human spaceflight capability. Through this activity, NASA also may be able to spur economic growth as potential new space markets are created.

Once developed, crew transportation capabilities could become available to commercial and government customers.

"The next American-flagged vehicle to carry our astronauts into space is going to be a U.S. commercial provider," said Ed Mango, NASA's Commercial Crew Program manager. "The partnerships NASA is forming with industry will support the development of multiple American systems capable of providing future access to low-Earth orbit."

These awards are a continuation of NASA's CCDev initiatives, which began in 2009 to stimulate efforts within U.S. industry to develop and demonstrate human spaceflight capabilities.

del.icio.us	Digg	Reddit
YahooMyWeb	Google	Facebook

India Starts Countdown For Launch Of Three Satellites Kazakh Space Launch Project Delayed Until 2017 Putin Urges Ukraine To Join New Russian Space Center Project Arianespace to launch ASTRA 2E Satellite A Tale Of Two Deserts Mars Rover's 'Gagarin' Moment Applauded Exploration Mars Flight Possible After 2035 Several Drives This Week Put Opportunity Over 17-Mile Mark BRP To Contribute To Canadian Moon And Mars Exploration Programs Naveen Jain Co-Founder And Chairman Of Moon Express Project Morpheus To Begin Testing At NASA's Johnson Space Center NASA Announces Winners Of 18th Annual Great Moonbuggy Race The PI's Perspective: Pinch Me! Later, Uranus: New Horizons Passes Another Planetary Milestone Can WISE Find The Hypothetical Tyche In Distant Oort Cloud Theory: Solar system has another planet The Shocking Environment Of Hot Jupiters Titan-Like Exoplanets A New Way To Find Planets Telescope Ferrets Out Planet-Hunting Targets NASA awards $270 million in spaceship contracts No Fleet Future For X-37B Model Of Russian Piloted Spacecraft To Go On Show In August 100-Year Starship Study Strategic Planning Workshop Held Asia's star ever brighter in space What Future for Chang'e-2 China setting up new rocket production base China's Tiangong-1 To Be Launched By Modified Long March II-F Rocket Fast-Rotating Asteroid Winks For Astronomer's Camera Cold Asteroids May Have A Soft Heart WISE Mission Spots 'Horseshoe' Asteroid WISE Mission Spots Horseshoe Asteroid