Their ‘Dream Chaser’ IS a space ship….
A bit small then the Space Shuttle….
Way smaller than Star Trek Space Ship….
But bigger then the American return to space capsules….
Sierra Nevad lost out in first round effort for America to have its own capability to put people in space…
Now they are back with a retooled ‘Dream Chaser’ and even a wish for their own space station….
The new version of the Dream Chaser named ‘Tenacity’ will only carry cargo and is expected to fly sometime later this year…The company wants to still move to manned space ships if given a chance….
Sierra Nevada, the company aiming to launch and land its Dream Chaser spaceplane on the Space Coast, unveiled its take on an Earth-orbiting space station this week, joining a series of others aiming to find alternatives to the aging International Space Station.
Renderings released by the Colorado-based company show a low-orbit station comprised of several inflatable modules, each 27 feet in length, flanked by Dream Chaser mini-shuttles. Inflatable fabric habitats are generally more compact and lighter than traditional space structures and can fly on many different vehicles.
Sierra Nevada on Wednesday said the proposed space station uses the company’s products from top to bottom, including Dream Chaser, the disposable Shooting Star cargo module, and its in-development inflatable habitats.
“The next phase is to create a completely holistic space infrastructure,” said Janet Kavandi, an executive vice president at Sierra Nevada and former space shuttle astronaut. “We plan to launch our vehicles to our platform with inflatable modules, service it with our own Dream Chaser vehicles both crewed and uncrewed, take people back and forth from the station, and then return them safely to Earth.”…
Note…
NASA is out of building it’s own vehicle’s for space use….
Development is now in the hands of private concerns that must be monitored by NASA…..
image…Sierra Nevada Corp