WASHINGTON, July 22 (RIA Novosti) – US aerospace giant Boeing on Monday offered a first look inside a full-scale model of the Hershey’s Kiss-shaped spacecraft it is developing for NASA to fly astronauts to low-Earth orbit destinations like the International Space Station (ISS).
Wearing the same launch and re-entry spacesuits used aboard the space shuttle, NASA astronauts Serena Aunon and Randy Bresnik climbed into the model of Boeing’s Crew Space Transportation-100 (CST-100) spacecraft at the company’s Houston product support center near NASA’s Johnson Space Center to test maneuverability inside the capsule.
The Boeing engineers who designed the capsule, which has room for up to seven astronauts, drew from the company’s experience as the lead space shuttle contractor and its history of building the command module for NASA’s Apollo program.
Bigelow Aerospace built the outer shell of the 15-foot-wide (4.6 meters) capsule, while Boeing outfitted most of the inside of the capsule.
“The floor and what we call the seat struts – where the seats sit – were built by our Boeing commercial airplane folks,” Boeing engineer Tony Castilleja said at the launch.
Earlier this month, Boeing put the CST-100, which is designed to land on the ground, through tests to show that astronauts would be able to safely exit the spacecraft in the event of an emergency water landing.
“Crew safety is our top priority,” said Alex Diaz, Boeing’s director for that series of tests.
“A water landing is unlikely but it’s important that we test the spacecraft in all potential scenarios,” he added.
Boeing is one of three US aerospace companies, along with Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) and Sierra Nevada Corporation, competing for NASA’s business to ferry astronauts to and from low-Earth orbit.
The first piloted orbital flight of the CST-100 capsule is scheduled for 2016.
