SpaceX Ends Production of Crew Dragon, America’s Only Human-Rated Spacecraft

The War Zone ^ | 3/29/22 | Victoria Scott

[Yo-Yo]

Only four units were ever produced.

SpaceX has had a variety of struggles and successes since its inception 20 years ago, but one of its most resounding victories has been the successful development and flights of its manned space capsule, the Crew Dragon. The Crew Dragon capsule line has already completed four successful manned missions and is currently in orbit on its fifth manned flight. While the capsules are reusable and will continue to see service in coming years, SpaceX has decided to end production of the capsule after the fourth vehicle's production, according to a report from Reuters.

The Crew Dragon's importance to NASA is hard to understate, as it is the only human-approved, low-earth-orbit-transport that the U.S. currently has access to launch from its own soil. For nearly a decade after the discontinuation of the Shuttle program, NASA's only option to ferry astronauts to and from the International Space Station were Russian Soyuz rockets launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, which is leased to Russia through 2050. As Russia's space agency Roscosmos increasingly joins the saber-rattling of the Russian government at large, having a domestic option to carry American astronauts back and forth to the ISS is not just a point of national pride, it's prudent.

And the Crew Dragon's results have been promising, too. Three of the four vehicles already have flown to the ISS, crew members on board, on the back of the company's own Falcon line of rockets. The decision to stop manufacturing more vehicles was seen as inevitable, but the specific fleet plans were unknown until yesterday when Reuters interviewed SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell.

"We are finishing our final (capsule), but we still are manufacturing components, because we'll be refurbishing," Shotwell said. She also added that the company would keep the ability to produce more Crew Dragon vehicles in the future if needed, but that SpaceX needs to ensure it can manage its fleet. NASA as of last year was still working on determining just how many times the Crew Dragon capsules could be used before they would need to be retired for safety reasons, and Shotwell has previously stated it is designed for "five to ten missions." NASA previously also announced that SpaceX's vehicles would be needed for more missions than initially planned, as Boeing's Starliner—SpaceX's main competitor, who also has a contract for crewed ISS missions with NASA—has been delayed due to development problems.

The Crew Dragon's successor, SpaceX's Starship, would theoretically replace the Crew Dragon with higher payloads and more reusability, with SpaceX CEO Elon Musk saying it will allow humanity to become an interplanetary species due to its lifting power and potential range.

However, it has been plagued by regulatory environmental review issues regarding its Boca Chica, Texas launch site and repeated test failures, and has had its own timeline for launch moved back repeatedly. While the most recent launch of the SN15 test rocket was successful, it has yet to complete an orbital test, though one is planned for May of this year, per Musk. The lengthy NASA human-rated certification process will also likely take years to complete—the parachute and abort system testing of Crew Dragon took roughly four years from its initial test phase to actually carrying astronauts to the ISS.

While the current Starship timeline projects that a crewed flyby of the Moon could potentially happen as early as next year, Musk has also said that Starship will be tested "hundreds of times" before flying with humans on board. Additionally, Musk has added on Twitter recently that Starship will likely be further delayed because of a reprioritization of SpaceX "to cyber defense & overcoming signal jamming." All of this comes on top of the CEO's comments last year that the company could potentially face bankruptcy if the economy heads into rough waters and Starship does not become profitable rapidly enough.

With potential further Starship delays ahead and five of the 20 to 40 potential flights the current four-vehicle fleet of Crew Dragons are capable of already launched, NASA might need SpaceX's Dragon production capacity yet again in the future if the capsule's discontinuation impacts future ISS flights. After all, it's not looking like asking Russia for a ride again is looking any better by the day.

[Yo-Yo]

If NASA abandons the ISS, then there will be nowhere for Crew Dragon to go...

[al baby]

Elon will put up is own space station

[markman46]

This is why the crew dragon is reusable,

[who_would_fardels_bear]

The ISS continues to show us that outerspace is a horrible place for humans, and that microgravity has not yet proven to be useful enough in manufacturing to offset the cost of putting factories in space.

We should be spending all of NASA's budget on telescopes and probes.

When and if we discover some safe, inexpensive, and reasonably inexhaustible form of energy then we can think about putting humans safely into space, e.g. large rotating cylinders clad in magnetic fields or sufficient amounts of matter to provide simulated gravity and protection from cosmic rays.

[JD_UTDallas]

Dragon was always only temporary program so SpaceX could get the experience with the technology of human space flight and specifically deep space flight Dragon from the start was designed to go outside earth’s orbit. Musk plans to go to Mars the whole.existence of SpaceX is for that purpose everything else is secondary. There was plans to send Dragons as far as Mars itself. the original Dragon had retro propulsive landing capabilities no parachutes needed it could set itself down to a zero zero landing in earth’s gravity well which means the moon at 1/6 G and Mars with less than 3/4 G is easy peasy. Falcon Heavy was designed to allow a three launch mission with two heavy sending up tankers to fuel Red Dragon and land over a tonne of payload on the surface of Mars with Dragon itself not being part of that payload. The plan was a sample return mission using as boost back Mars return vehicle launched through the docking port of.Dragon. This man thinks big. Dragon is the ONLY human rates spacecraft that had the technology and more importantly the legs via falcon heavy to leave earth’s gravity well and return no other current space vehicle has that capability. The Ares fiasco aka corporate welfare make work jobs pork project is just that a giant boondoggle to keep senators lobbyists happy it will never touch SpaceX in efficiency,reusability,or cost. Falcon Heavy is ten times cheaper per lb than the billion and a half per shot SLS fiasco. Starship is being crippled by the EPA and FAA at the whim of the admin who hates Musk and all the senators who will lose SLS money when starship fly 100+ tonnes to orbit for one tenth as much as SLS. Musk needs to find another country to build it in Mexico perhaps he is already building two ocean rig based launch platforms to.launch.from international.waters so he can tell the FAA to.stuff it.

[BobL]

“We should be spending all of NASA’s budget on telescopes and probes.”

Agree, let’s spend it on the Homeless (since that’s the only place the money will go, given our uniparty Congress).

[Vermont Lt]

The moon has supplies of H3, which I’ve read would be useable as rocket fuel. This would make the moon the gas station for flights around the solar system.

[PIF]

Boeing's Starliner - SpaceX's main competitor, who also has a contract for crewed ISS missions with NASA - has been delayed due to development problems.

As expected.

(SpaceX's Starship) has been plagued by regulatory environmental review issues regarding its Boca Chica, Texas launch site and repeated test failures, and has had its own timeline for launch moved back repeatedly

Deliberately delayed by FAA. Test failures are part of rapid prototyping - hinder or delay that process, as the Feds are doing, will kill StarShip.

Authoress's experience is not in SpaceX or space related articles, but in car reviews which may account for her slightly hostile tone.

[bigbob]

I have more confidence in Musk’s ability to map out and implement a development plan than I do of NASA.

They’ll be too busy working on woke climate BS anyway.

[citizen]

who = old man railing at clouds.

[who_would_fardels_bear]

I don't want to spend it on the homeless. If you give money to the homeless you get more homeless.

If you give more money to idiots who want to wither away in microgravity while being bombarded by cosmic rays, then you will get more idiots who want to wither away in microgravity while being bombarded by cosmic rays.

[who_would_fardels_bear]

Having people go on short trips to the Moon to harvest H3 might make sense, but it might make more sense to just send robots there.

I highly recommend "Moon". A great SF movie on this very topic.

[who_would_fardels_bear]

citizen = Musk fanboy Kool-Aid drinker.

Did you buy any NFTs?

How did that work out for you?

[cgbg]

“Musk needs to find another country to build it”

Agreed—the US is a hostile regulatory environment these days.

Musk needs to fully decouple from NASA in every detail—then the good stuff can start to happen.

No more waiting on NASA’s billion dollar space suits:

https://qz.com/2046840/a-1-billion-space-suit-is-holding-up-nasas-2024-moon-landing/

[BereanBrain]

It’s a power play.

What Elon SHOULD do is

1) Raise the price of a Crew Dragon Ride 500%
2) Tell the Guvvies that the future “rides” will only be via the Starship after a certain date.

WHY? How about the FAA’s/EPA’s 8 month delay to Starship testing in Boca Chica? Biden DOES NOT LIKE ELON, so he’ “punishing” him. That’s one reason why Elon has had to start building a launch complex for starship at the cape, because FAA/EPA may NEVER approve launches from Boca Chica (well as long as Biden is in office).

[BereanBrain]

Just move the whole complex to the Mexican side of the river it sit next to.....I am sure Mexico would give lots of tax rebates and free land to get it.

In fact, just move the launch pad, keep the rest of the infrastructure at Boca Chica.
Just do a “Hop” across the river, and launch!

Screw you liberals!

[Boogieman]

I suppose He3 might be usable as rocket fuel, but it’s really desired as a possibly more viable path to nuclear fusion than tritium and deuterium. Still, we don’t actually have the technology to make viable fusion reactors even if we had access to all the He3 on the moon, so right now it’s not even usable for that.

[markman46]

you are not telling me anything i dont already know about. starship will fly into orbit, the FAA has been pissed at spacex for a while now. and they keep pushing back the release of the environmental report.

[Colo9250]

Right and the FAA management needs a complete anal probe with spikes. The first thing Republicans need to do is fire with prejudice the entire management of the FAA.

The FAA has proven to be as incompetent as the FBI and just as partisan.