London – Al Quds Al Arabi: SpaceX, owned by well-known American businessman Elon Musk, has finished production of new astronaut capsules, called “Crew Dragon”, two years after the company transported humans into space for the first time.
There are now actually four capsules in the SpaceX fleet, as these capsules primarily aim to transport astronauts to the International Space Station and then return them to Earth, according to what the British newspaper “Daily Mail” published in a report seen by “Al Quds Al Arabi.”
The Crew Dragon capsule is the first spacecraft to be operated and built specifically to transport humans to outer orbit, and SpaceX has been the first to take astronauts to the International Space Station from American soil since the end of the space shuttle program in 2011.
Since its debut in 2020, the Crew Dragon spacecraft has flown humans into space five times, including the first fully commercial crew orbiting Earth.
Work will continue to build new components and spare parts for the current “Dragon” fleet, which includes: effort, flexibility, endurance and freedom.
SpaceX executives say the shift is to shift resources to the next-generation spaceship program, known as Starship, which will include a lunar lander, the Daily Mail reported.
The spacecraft’s first launch has been delayed by several months due to engine development hurdles and regulatory reviews, but the first orbital flight is scheduled for this year.
According to the British newspaper report, the new capsule “Crow Dragon” is a rocket and spacecraft that Elon Musk says will be used to make humanity able to move between planets, allowing the establishment of a colony on Mars.
This shift poses new challenges for SpaceX as the company learns how to maintain the fleet and solve unexpected problems quickly without disrupting a busy schedule of astronaut missions.
“We’re finishing up our final (capsule), but we’re still making the ingredients because we’re going to renovate,” said Gwen Shotwell, president of SpaceX.
She added that SpaceX would retain the ability to build more capsules if needed in the future, but stressed that “fleet management is key.”
A key aspect of SpaceX’s success is being able to save money by reusing components, including the first stage of the rocket, and it appears that the spacecraft will become part of this frugal approach.
The Daily Mail says the company is supposed to stop production at some point and switch to managing its fleet and arranging launches around the four spacecraft, but the timing of that is still unknown.
Crew Dragon capsules have transported five crews of government and private astronauts into space since 2020, when it transported its first pair of NASA astronauts and became the primary flight for the US space agency to transport humans to and from the International Space Station.
The creation of this capsule ended nearly ten years of NASA’s dependence on Russia to transport its crew to the extraterrestrial space station, where the Soyuz spacecraft was used, which was launched from the Baikonur base in Kazakhstan.
After each flight, the capsules undergo regeneration at SpaceX’s facilities in Florida, which the company calls “Dragonland.” “There are life-cycle issues, as once you start using this capsule for the third, fourth, and fifth time, you start finding things,” said retired NASA astronaut and former SpaceX CEO Garrett Reisman, who advises on spaceflight issues. different.”
But he added, “SpaceX is really good at quickly identifying these issues and then acting quickly to fix them.” An example of this was the investigation in 2021 where, within months, the company discovered a toilet leak on a space capsule that was used to transport humans twice.
And NASA gave SpaceX $3.5 billion to develop and use these capsules on six trips to the space station.
When NASA awarded its contract to SpaceX, it also gave another contract to Boeing, and the two companies were scheduled to share flights to space, but SpaceX only transported the crew.
And SpaceX transported four crews of astronauts to the space station under its contract with NASA, at a cost of $255 million per flight.
The company carried out an entirely special mission last year with four passengers, including a billionaire businessman who financed the flight, on a three-day trip into Earth orbit, known as “Inspiration4”.
Musk, the founder and CEO of SpaceX, has focused intensely in recent years on the accelerated development of the reusable Starship, a cornerstone of Musk’s goal of eventually colonizing Mars.
“The goal is to have aircraft-like operations where you can take the car after it lands, fill it up with gas and oxygen, and come back again very quickly,” Raisman said.