Mary-Louise Hoffman
Lockheed Martin and Sierra Nevada‘s alliance has moved to increase manufacturing work on a private space taxi at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans.
SNC has been contracted to build the next-generation Dream Chaser spacecraft for NASA and is working with Lockheed to produce the spaceship’s composite structures, the companies said Tuesday.
“We will be utilizing MAF’s existing facilities, partnerships and the workforce of Louisiana to bring America’s future transportation vehicles for low-Earth orbit to reality while continuing to expand the Dream Chaser program footprint, which now provides employment in over 30 states,” said Mark Sirangelo, corporate vice president and head of SNC Space Systems.
The Dream Chaser is scheduled for an orbital flight on Nov. 1.
“Not only are we leveraging manufacturing processes and technology, we are also leveraging the Human Rating Certification methodology developed by the Orion program, which was then tailored to Dream Chaser,” said Jim Crocker, Lockheed’s vice president and general manager of civil space.
NASA’s Michoud facility has previously been used to support construction work for the Apollo and Orion human spaceflight programs.
