Orbital Buys One Atlas V Launch (Maybe Two) for Cygnus
Orbital Announces Additional Details Concerning CRS Program and Antares Launcher Go-Forward Plans
“Orbital has contracted with United Launch Alliance for an Atlas V launch of a Cygnus cargo spacecraft from Cape Canaveral, Florida, in the fourth quarter of 2015, with an option for a second Atlas V launch in 2016 if needed. The Atlas rocket’s greater lift capacity will allow Cygnus to carry nearly 35% more cargo to the ISS than previously planned for CRS missions in 2015.”
Wow. Big bucks! they must really resent SpaceX. I wasn’t aware there were spare Atlas’s at such short notice.
SpaceX has already committed to launch customers and have a full launch manifest, they would have to bump someone or push someone back to squeeze in Orbital launches. Lockheed doesn’t have many commercial customers beating down their doors for launches.
That is true, but in the past SpaceX has made some fast changes. One of the reasons (besides switching from vandenberg to Florida) for the Falcon Heavy launch delay until July of next year is that it used engines and cores from FH’s to use as F9s.
Also, they swapped around cores for a flight that could of tested the landing but it went with no legs.
So the question is, could SpaceX shoehorn them in, or was Orbital having a snit about being dissed by Musk?
If I were an Orbital stockholder I would really want to know.
Granted … BUT … would you take the risk making “fast changes” to help your competitor?
Not me. Orbital received 1.9 billion for 8 launches, and SpaceX 1.6 billion for 12 launches. Orbital is still going to be paid for that launch because it actually left the pad before exploding. I would not allow them to profit from me so make them pay more by utilizing a legacy company.
I would think a big reason Spacex wouldn’t want to, is because it would delay falcon heavy debut.
Makes sense to let OS have to pay top dollar.
Do you know that for sure? That Orbital gets paid for that launch? Certainly insurance is part of the picture but not even NASA would contract a common carrier for goods and pay if they are lost in transit?
“PARIS — Orbital Sciences Corp. will get most of its planned revenue from NASA for the Oct. 28 launch of Orbital’s Antares rocket despite the rocket’s failure because the milestone that triggered payment was the rocket’s ignition and liftoff, not launch success, Orbital and its prospective merger partner, Alliant Techsystems (ATK), said Nov. 24”
and
“While the CRS contract with NASA is based on a service-delivery model, NASA and Orbital structured it so that Orbital receives milestone payments tied to launches. It is not uncommon in launch contracts to make “intentional ignition” a milestone that, for example, signals the end of one contractual relationship and the beginning of another — even if ignition and liftoff are followed by explosion and failure. For Orbital’s CRS contract, each launch has two milestone payments. The first payment is for ignition and liftoff. The second is for final mission success. With the payload destroyed, NASA will not be paying Orbital the expected $48 million for mission success. Orbital had taken out an insurance policy for that piece of the mission and will thus receive $48 million in insurance proceeds. Orbital said the insurance “will cover the entire final milestone payment.” It was unclear whether Orbital had also insured itself for the cost of its insurance premium. Orbital did not disclose the amount of the milestone payment it expects from NASA for the launch. With the launch vehicle paid for by NASA as scheduled, and the insurance proceeds covering the rest, the Oct. 28 failure looks revenue-neutral to Orbital.”
http://spacenews.com/42658o…
So they get about 237 million a flight minus 48 million and NASA will pay 187 million for the launch.
Its was the other alternative that has capacity issues with oversubscribed launch manifests
That is really unexpected. Atlas V availability and price are two really big negatives. Hopefully they only need to buy one launch!
Ironic maybe, but hardly unexpected. It was being seriously discussed here at least as far back as 11/5 in a thread that you participated in: http://nasawatch.com/archiv…
given the negatives, it is pretty severely ironic.
Funny: They’re switching from one Russian propulsion system to another…
Bad: They don’t trust their own one.
It seems that Orbital still doesn’t understand the cause of the last failure but they want to complete the contract with NASA by the end of 2016. Maybe this is the cheapest solution.
not after 2020 according to senate/house conference language
So, they go from a russkie nk-33 to a russkie rd-180 to a russkie RD-193 (called RD-181 as an export model).
(In a Ukrainian first stage to carry a cargo canister made in Italy)
As a general rule, companies charge the governent more for the same product. Lockheed might be selling them the Atlas V at a discount from the price they charge Uncle Sugar.
Hmm. I wonder if ‘same’ is really what you mean? Perhaps the government has additional requirements not needed or requested by the private contractor? Certainly that’s true in the case of Atlas.
Yes exact same products. I remember a couple contracts I did with the gov. I had to produce documentation that even the nails and screws met gov. specs. So there was a lot of paperwork that for a normal contract you wouldn’t even bother with on what seems standard industry products.
Thats the chief reason SpaceX flys a F9 for a commercial customer for $60mill and the Feds for $90mill – for the same beast.
SpaceX says that NASA or USAF people essentially take up living quarters with them.
Now that is commercial space.
Putin is OK with the Russkie atlas V being used for non military US purposes.
Can’t help but note, an awful lot of these tax-dollars intended to develop domestic US launch capability keeps being sent to Russia one way or another.
With perhaps one exception….
Agreed that there are an awful lot of tax-dollars intended to develop domestic US launch capability being set to Russia (and other countries) one way or another.
But there is most definitely more than one exception to that…
No great surprise; IMHO, SpaceX never had the room in their manifest to launch both CRS vehicles.
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Looks like the Cygnus extended will just barely fit in the 4m XEPF fairing. Also, this means that there will be no late loads as I believe the fairing will have to be buttoned up even before the entire structure is vertically integrated.
So who needs Orbital? NASA could have booked a flight on an Atlas and cut out the middleman. NASA should have just contracted for the 8 Cygnus craft and booked their own launches. It would have been more of a sure thing.