Sierra Nevada Chafes at NASA Space Taxi SelectionsPC Magazine
By Damon Poeter September 28, 2014 11:58am EST
SpaceX and Boeing were awarded coveted contracts to ferry astronauts to space, but Sierra Nevada isn't taking the rejection of its bid sitting down.
SNC Dream Chaser SpaceX and Boeing were awarded coveted NASA contracts earlier this month to ferry astronauts to low-Earth orbit on privately built space taxis. But Sierra Nevada, the third bidder in the space agency's multi-year Commercial Crew Integrated Capability (CCiCap) initiative, isn't taking its rejection sitting down.
Sierra Nevada said Friday that it had filed a formal protest with the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) over NASA's selection of Boeing and SpaceX to build and operate space taxis capable of taking astronauts to destinations like the International Space Station (ISS), according to The Wall Street Journal.
The private space firm claimed its proposed space vehicle, a winged space plane capable of landing on a runway after trips to space, would cost NASA $900 million less to build and operate than the traditional crew capsules SpaceX and Boeing have proposed.
NASA's contract with Boeing could be worth as much as $4.2 billion, while the deal with SpaceX could total $2.6 billion, according to the Journal.
Sierra Nevada said of NASA's selection document and debrief that it shows "there are serious questions and inconsistencies in the source selection process," the Journal reported. The space agency has not yet made public the specific details of its selection process.
The paper cited a NASA spokesperson as saying that the agency "wouldn't have any comment while the protest is pending" with the GAO.
NASA awarded the three private space firms $1.1 billion back in the summer of 2012 to design and develop vehicles to carry astronauts into space by 2017. Since the retirement of the space shuttle fleet in 2011, NASA has relied on the Russian space agency Roscosmos to carry its astronauts to the ISS.
Back in 2012, Sierra Nevada received $212.5 million from NASA to further develop its Dream Chaser space plane, a reusable space vehicle designed to ferry up to seven astronauts to low Earth orbit (artist's rendering pictured above).
Boeing was awarded $460 million as part of the inaugural CCiCap program, while SpaceX, the first private space firm to orchestrate a successful cargo run to the ISS, received $440 million.
Sierra Nevada "lagged behind the other two bidders in some technical rankings," the Journal cited unnamed sources as saying.
For its part, the company claimed that its proposed space taxi operation was the second-lowest priced submission of the three and that it "also achieved mission suitability scores comparable to the other two proposals," according to the paper.
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