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NASA receives proposal for next spaceship

Lockheed Martin designs craft for trips to moon, Mars

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - The future of human space transportation, not only into Earth orbit, but also back to the moon and on to Mars, kick-started this week as NASA received contractor proposals for the Crew Exploration Vehicle.

A glimpse into one concept — provided by Lockheed Martin Space Systems near Denver — shows a lifting body craft that can be outfitted for lunar as well as Mars operations.

“Basically what we came down on was the side of safety for the crew in making our decision to go with a lifting body,” said Patrick McKenzie, CEV business development manager at Lockheed Martin Space Systems Co.

Additionally, the design of the basic vehicle would allow it to be utilized to support near-term human expeditions to the moon, as well as Mars in the future, McKenzie told Space.com in a phone interview.

Lifting-body approach

McKenzie said the lifting-body design was preferred over a capsule for several reasons.

For one, that approach allows more cross-range maneuverability; thus the craft can touch down on land versus water. Secondly, a lifting body can lessen the G-loads on crews returning from long-duration space stints, McKenzie said.

Whether they are lengthy stays in Earth orbit, a prolonged mission on the moon, or the round-trip trauma on the human body from a Mars mission, the lifting-body approach helps to minimize the G-forces on crew members, McKenzie noted.

Titanium shell

As part of a flight test program, McKenzie said that an unpiloted, full-scale version of the front-end of the company’s CEV design — a rescue module — would be flown to verify the safety elements of getting a crew back under a wide range of circumstances. That would take place in 2008.

One feature of the CEV design from the Lockheed Martin-led team is the use of a titanium shell, along with two layers of thermal protection materials.

“Even in the highly unlikely circumstance that you might have a burn-through of the outer thermal protection system, the crew compartment inside would maintain its integrity, and that burn-through would not end up being a fatal situation for the crew,” McKenzie said.

Ready for Mars?

McKenzie emphasized that the first mission for a CEV is returning to low Earth orbit. “But it makes sense to make sure that the vehicle that you’re developing this first go-round is going to be lunar-capable,” he added, with the firm’s engineers also looking into how the concept could be made Mars-ready.

“We’re attempting to the best extent possible to build in modularity into our systems and maintainability and ease of operations … so as new technologies and new capabilities are developed over the next 10 to 15 to 20 years, we’ll be able to take advantage of those without having to totally redesign a new vehicle,” McKenzie said.

McKenzie said that Lockheed Martin stands ready to work with NASA to help realize an objective stated by incoming NASA chief Michael Griffin — to try to close the gap between shutdown of the shuttle in 2010 and the scheduled start of operations for a piloted CEV in 2014.

Furthermore, use of the CEV to support the International Space Station (http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=195880&page=1) is on the table.

“Our CEV will certainly be capable of servicing station,” McKenzie stated, but the company’s proposal did not address that use as a top requirement. This prospect would receive a thorough look early in the execution of a CEV program if the firm is selected, he said.

NASA has announced in the past the plan to award two teams CEV work this September.

© 2005 Space.com. All rights reserved. More from Space.com.



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I think we need more details on what each parts of the Space craft are for and what they do.

wjfox2000 I dont suppose you know any links to sites about how space could be commercilized, or anything around that subject? Would be much appreciated.

Interesting....this looks way better than those Apollo like capsules. I hope this design or something similar to it wins the bid!

About time we see some progress on the CEV.

Has Boeing revealed its proposal yet?

I can see theres alot of the old design in this new one, but if im honest, I think boeing's proposal is much more exiting

wjfox2000 I dont suppose you know any links to sites about how space could be commercilized, or anything around that subject? Would be much appreciated.

Aren't Virgin planning on commercial space trips soonish?

Aren't Virgin planning on commercial space trips soonish?

Yes, I think Virgin made a deal with that guy who flew Space Ship 1 into space last year, forgot his name. Anyway by 2008 we should have the beginning of a new tourist industry. I wonder how much Virgin will charge for a flight into space. A lot methinks.

They are Charging something like £250,000+ and already have a very large list of people who have signed up to fly.

250,000+ seems a bit expensive. When are they introducing budget carriers like Easyshuttle?

250 000 seems like a bargain to me considering that South African millionaire paid the Russians like $10 million for a flight into space.

wjfox2000 I dont suppose you know any links to sites about how space could be commercilized, or anything around that subject? Would be much appreciated.

http://www.permanent.com - a site about commercial mining of asteroids.

http://www.thespacereview.com - a site with in-depth articles about space exploration and commercialization.

http://www.jrmooneyham.com/future_history_timeline.html - a fascinating site with extremely detailed predictions about all aspects of makind's future, including space commercialization.

http://ipp.nasa.gov - NASA's "Innovative Partnerships Program" homepage.

Nice, thanks alot mate.

i have hgeard quotes for £100 000 from virgin, we maybe getting dollar conversion inflation in the above quotes.

Its more or less £100,000 to go with virgin, and that includes a 2 day training course for the flight.

Its been held back lately though because there are very few laws and regulations regarding space travel, so a lot of laws are being drawn up at the minute.


As for Lockheeds attempt at the CEV, it worries me how small the actual cabin appears to be. This is supposed to be the replacement for the space shuttle aswell as a lunar and mars bound exploration vehicle.

I saw a schematic of the cabin section on www.space.com yesterday, and it looked ridiculously small. Seems since then they have removed the picture......


But I have to say it is not exactly cutting edge in design. No major leaps forward, which inevitably just means another giant leap backwards in space exploration. Dissapointing.

I hope that these diagrams and details are only an initial "stop-gap" P.R. measure to keep people interested, because NO-ONE is going to Mars in that.


Anyway, Nasa Administrator Michael Griffin has stated that he wants the CEV to weigh no less than 30 tonnes empty, and has to be able to lift roughly 100 tonnes into orbit and beyond - a big ask for the limited budget.


It will be interesting to see how this progresses - do NASA go hell for leather and build themselves a beast of a spacecraft, or do they chicken out and build another obsolete trash can?