The Politics Behind The Success Of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon Demo-2
How NASA made a bet in 2011 and it finally worked out.
On the 21st of July 2011, NASA’s last space shuttle, Atlantis was landing in Florida before retiring, and signing the end of an American era of human space flights. Since then, American astronauts depended on Russia’s Soyuz rockets to reach the International Space Station … up until now.
Last weekend (August 2nd), Crew Dragon Demo-2 landed in the Atlantic Ocean after spending 63 days in space. It’s the first crewed mission to reach the ISS aboard a private spaceship and it’s an important milestone not only for Space X but also for NASA. After almost 10 years depending on Russia, this collaboration will allow the American space agency to finally recover control over their own human space missions.
But why was NASA dependent on Russia in the first place and what does Space X’s success mean in the long run?
Shutting down the Space Shuttle program, between an economic crisis and a presidential shuffle
The Space Shuttle program was designed in the 1970s and operated for 30 years between 1981 and 2011. The original goal of this program was to build a renewable spaceship at a low cost to allow routine transportation for the development of the International Space Station. In reality, the cost ended up much more expensive than expected with a spending of 192 billion dollars in 30 years meaning almost 1.5 billion dollars for a single launch.
Seeing the disastrous money vacuum that was the program and wanting to develop other space aspects, President Bush announced his desire to cancel the program in 2004. It was voted in 2010 and became effective in 2011. In the meantime, Bush developed his new plan for NASA’s post Shuttle era called the Constellation Program, a mission to establish a Moon Base by 2020 and later on, to reach for Mars.
Unfortunately, when Obama wins the presidential election in 2008, in a time of deep economic crisis, his administration evaluates old budgets looking to make cuts. The Augustine Commission is created with the main goal to evaluate NASA’s budget spending. Realizing that Bush’s plan was too behind schedule and too expensive, Obama chooses to cancel the Constellation Program in 2009.
From the Shuttle to the Altair module and the Ares I-V to the Orion module and SLS, in the 2000s, the USA’s space policy was changing so much from one administration to the other that politics came in the way of engineers focusing on developing one functional new rocket to send astronauts to the ISS. That’s the main reason why in 2011, the USA was left with no domestic possibility to send their astronauts to space.
Therefore, the only solution was to negotiate with Russia to use the Soyuz rockets as a provisory way to send American astronauts to the ISS for the cost of around 81 million dollars a seat. But, what was supposed to be a temporary replacement became the only way for humans to reach the ISS for almost 10 years.
How did this happen?
Opening space to private companies, America’s best bet for a cost-saving solution
Observing the birth of many private companies looking to develop crewed spacecraft, Obama’s government and NASA decided to start new collaborations. If NASA was already working with external companies to buy hardware in the past (Lunar Module of Apollo Missions for example), it never was open to buy services from these companies before the birth of the Commercial Crew Program in 2011. With this new program, the American government decided to invest in commercial spaceflight companies, putting them in charge of developing the next spaceship to supply the ISS while NASA focused on a Super-Heavy Rocket (the SLS rocket and Orion module) for deep-space missions.
After numerous contesting phases, in 2014, NASA selected the two most promising companies, Space X and Boeing, to develop the new crewed vehicles and the first crewed flights were expected in 2017. If both companies were already helping with getting supplies to the ISS, the task of adapting their spaceship for human travel became more complicated than anticipated extending their deadlines each year since 2017.
Relying only on commercial companies to develop a functional spacecraft for the ISS became America’s cost-saving bet in a time of economic crisis. A dangerous bet raising more concerns over the passing years, as the deadlines were pushed repeatedly and political tensions with Russia were rising.
International politics, 9 years rhythmed by Russia’s pressure over a powerless USA
The success of this mission was long-awaited as tensions with Russia and the several issues appearing on the Soyuz rockets and spacecraft were putting in danger the ISS missions these past years. Indeed, Russia threatened the USA to stop sending their astronaut several times since 2011, to retaliate against the American decisions concerning Syria’s and Ukraine’s conflict. The epitome of the tensions between the two countries was in 2014 when Putin announced its country will stop taking American astronauts to the ISS by 2020, to strike back against the United States’ sanctions on Russia’s invasion of Crimea.
So, Space X’s Demo-2 success arrives at the perfect moment as the USA wasn’t guaranteed any more spots aboard the Soyuz rockets since the end of 2019. The Crew Dragon success is now allowing NASA to take its independence back not only in space exploration but also in international politics.
A needed success promising a new future for space exploration
Space X can be proud of its accomplishment as its new reusable technology will drastically drop the cost of sending astronauts in space from 81–86 million dollars on a Soyuz rocket to around 55 million dollars on the Falcon 9 rocket. Not only will it save many millions of dollars, but it will also allow the new acceleration needed by space programs to start planning the Moon Base of the Artemis Program, and later on, the possibility to reach Mars.
But that’s not it!
This flight marks the beginning of a new era of space exploration; space tourism. For Space X, collaborating with NASA was just the first step towards commercial flights. It gave them the funds to develop their spacecraft, the safety and legitimacy of working with a recognized space agency but also the guarantee to be able to take tourists to the ISS once everything worked. If tourists have already visited the space station before, it was only thanks to the Russian agency. Now, NASA also announced opening the ISS to tourism in 2020.
Space X has already announced the next crewed mission for 2020 planned to launch for the ISS in September with NASA astronauts Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover, and Shannon Walker and Japan’s Soichi Noguchi onboard.
