NASA has announced the amendments to the launch service contract (NLS) II with SpaceX, turning on Starship among the existing boot options, along with the current Falcon 9 and Falcon. This update expands the ability to launch for the future research and scientific tasks of the US space agency.
What is NLS II contract? This is a versatile agreement with an unknown number of sources, ordering time until June 2030 and the total valid time until December 2032. New science.ru.
It is emphasized that putting Starship into NLS II contract will give NASA the opportunity to plan for completely different tasks in the long term due to the ability of Starship in the future to move heavily and reach the destination further, like the moon and Mars.
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Meanwhile, Starship is still in the development stage. As you know, Ilon's mask, twice the last debut has ended in failure. Before the whole world, “with fireworks.” Analysts believe that this can hit the current Starship test schedule.
What is the next? SpaceX has not yet confirmed the date of the next test flight. But so far, the company is still in accordance with its principles: the more tests, the faster the work solutions will be. However, the latest incidents emphasized the complexity of the mission that Ilon Musk and his group face.
Starship is a super heat transport missile. It consists of the first phase of 71 meters of super heavy and the second stage 52 meters-Starship universe. At the same time, the super heavy accelerator is equipped with 33 methane engines and six Raptor engines raising a spacecraft. The total height of the vehicle assembly after the recent modernization of the second phase is 123 meters. The launcher is developed as reusable. The total weight of the system is 5 thousand tons.
By the way, although Starship was carried out mainly with the flights of the flights to the Moon and Mars, but with another ambitious project related to it – replacing missile aircraft. A few years ago, a billionaire said: “Once a true success measure will be Starship's flights will become a common appearance.”