Space Florida Also Offers Congratulations

The Commercial Spaceflight Federation congratulates NASA and the winners of the Commercial Crew Transportation Capability (CCtCap) contract awards announced Tuesday. CCtCap is the latest round in NASA’s Commercial Crew Program that will develop domestic space transportation capabilities for NASA astronauts. Boeing and SpaceX were awarded fixed-price contracts totaling $6.8 billion to complete development, certify and launch their vehicles to include one crewed demo flight to the International Space Station (ISS).

“With this award, we are one major step closer to restoring our nation’s ability to launch U.S. astronauts to the ISS from American soil,” stated CSF President Michael Lopez-Alegria. “NASA’s Commercial Crew Program is developing safe, reliable transportation to low-Earth orbit through the use of innovative contracting mechanisms. NASA’s selection of two companies demonstrates its prudent commitment to both competition and operational redundancy. With these commercial companies developing transportation for astronauts to and from LEO, NASA can focus more of its resources on deep space exploration.”

“The Commercial Crew Program is the quickest and most cost-effective way to get our astronauts flying again in U.S. vehicles,” stated CSF Chairman Frank DiBello. “However, the beauty of the commercial space industry is in its diversity. While these companies work to restore crewed LEO transportation capabilities, other companies are working to grow those and other markets in space. CSF congratulates NASA on the awards and we look forward to supporting the next steps in the new space era.”

"Today's announcement is continued good news for Florida and for the nation," DiBello added in a separate statement issued by Space Florida. "It advances a new era in space transportation and is the next major step toward restoring U.S. capability to fly astronauts to the ISS and beyond.

"Both Boeing and SpaceX have already invested significant time and resources into establishing commercial crew operations here in Florida and we look forward to working hand-in-hand with both companies to make their upcoming missions successful."

FMI: www.commercialspaceflight.org, www.spaceflorida.com