Posts: 44004 From: Houston, TX Registered: Nov 1999
posted 06-03-2020 06:48 PM
NASA has modified SpaceX's commercial crew contract to allow for the use of flight-proven (reused) Falcon 9 rockets and Crew Dragon spacecraft for crewed missions beginning with Crew 2 (Post-Certification Mission-2 or PCM-2).
The purpose of this bilateral modification is to extend the Demo-2 flight test from two weeks to up to 119 days and add the requirement for 45th Operations Group Detachment 3 (DET-3) joint test training for PCM-1 through PCM-6 in exchange for allowing reuse of the Falcon 9 launch vehicle and Crew Dragon spacecraft beginning with PCM-2.
oly Member
Posts: 1050 From: Perth, Western Australia Registered: Apr 2015
posted 06-03-2020 07:50 PM
Great news for SpaceX and NASA, leveraging the reuse capability of the system will help to develop and refine the operation and benefit the program.
It is a shame that the number of missions has not been increased.