In an earlier diary, I promised to talk about the shuttle replacements (yes, thats plural, we will have more than one). The first one I am going to talk about is SpaceX's Dragon/Falcon 9 combo.
SpaceX is a company that was founded by PayPal's Founder Elon Musk. Some time ago, Darksyde interviewed Elon Musk about it. Actually, SpaceX has gotten quite big (currently, SpaceX employees 800 people, and operates out of the building the constructed the 747s). NASA recently included it in its "7 commercial spaceflight pioneers"
Their rocket in question is called the Falcon 9 (they have a smaller rocket called the Falcon 1, but we are talking about the Falcon 9). The vehicle can launch 10,450 kg into LEO. It actually has 9 engines on the first stage. Its first launch is scheduled for this March. One cool thing for those of you in Florida - its gonna launch at the Cape, and is in final processing there.
Their spacecraft is called the Dragon. Currently, NASA is only going to use it for cargo. However, SpaceX designed it to be manned from the beginning. So, now that NASA has decided to help create the Commercial Crew industry, you can bet SpaceX will go after it. Dragon can take 7 people into orbit, and deliver them to the space station.
Here is an earlier version of Dragon (I miss the Mickey Mouse solar panels :D ). A few other things - the first flight of Falcon 9 will have Dragon on board. Also, part of Dragon's docking hardware was tested on a recent shuttle flight.
And now for the really cool part. The videos.