In a surprise move NASA has chosen Lockheed Martin to build its new Orion spaceship over the Northrop Grumman/Boeing team that represented companies that built previous US manned spacecraft. Today Boeing provides the Space Shuttle orbiter and integrates it with Lockheed's external tank and ATK's solid rocket boosters. It is also an equal partner in the Shuttle operations joint venture, United Space Alliance, with Lockheed. Few companies can compare with Boeing's 40 years of manned spaceflight experience.
Lockheed's involvement in NASA's crashed Mars Polar Lander and the abandoned X-33 reusable launch vehicle all seemed to point to the winner being Northrop/Boeing.
The Lockheed choice suggests a strategy to abandon the 30-year-old Shuttle industry arrangement, probably because the US space exploration vision involves no substantial NASA budget increases. Its officials now emphasise life-cycle costs in all their decisions.
Major Ares launcher work is now with its Lockheed managed Louisiana facility.
Lockheed is to build Orion sections there as well. NASA could be placing its entire transport system with one company to drive down cost. When NASA administrator Michael Griffin says transition from Shuttle to Orion is the agency's biggest challenge, the choice of Lockheed is a bold one.
Source: Flight International
