NASA has announced that four veteran astronauts will conduct the first test flights of the SpaceX Dragon crew capsule and Boeing's own commercial spacecraft. Astronauts Sunita Williams, Robert Behnken, Douglas Hurley and Eric Boe all have prior space flight experience.
"These distinguished, veteran astronauts are blazing a new trail, a trail that will one day land them in the history books and Americans on the surface of Mars," NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said in a statement.
Boe and Hurley were both pilots with the latter serving on the last shuttle mission, STS-135. On the other hand, Williams and Behnken served as mission specialists. They have been selected to conduct test flights for Boeing's CST-100 and the SpaceX Dragon crew capsule, according to Space Flight Insider.
Ever since the Space Shuttle fleet was retired in 2011, NASA has relied on Russian Soyuz spacecraft to conduct resupply missions to the International Space Stations (ISS). But with strained US-Russia relations and Soyuz rides costing more than $70 million per astronaut, efforts are being made to bring back launches to American soil.
"The Commercial Crew Program is NASA's way of getting American astronauts back on American rockets for a lower rate," The Verge wrote.
Boeing and SpaceX were awarded contracts to build and run spacecraft to and from the ISS, according to the website. Apart from reducing costs, NASA said the program will generate jobs and free its hands for other endeavors.
"By working with American companies to get our astronauts to the ISS, NASA is able to focus on game-changing technologies, the Orion spacecraft and the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket that are geared toward getting astronauts to deep space," Bolden said.
Both the Boeing CST-100 and SpaceX Dragon crew capsule can carry a seven-man crew and first flights are scheduled for 2017. The NASA astronauts will reportedly train with the companies' own test pilots starting now.
