Sierra Nevada Corporation will join SpaceX and Dulles, Va.-based Orbital ATK in helping NASA supply the International Space Station. It's a surprise move from the space agency, which had been expected to stay with just two contracts, either dropping SpaceX or Orbital ATK or turning down SNC entirely.
As we've written before, commercial space companies competing and innovating is a good thing. The more players working in private space exploration, the better the payoffs will be for everyone, especially NASA. The technical difficulties and sheer cost of space travel is part of why NASA entertains private contractors to begin with, and the government can get cheaper prices with companies competing at they vie for contracts. And more competition will spur the companies to come up with new, better and cheaper ways to service the ISS and perform other missions.
NASA will spend up to $14 billion on the contract with the three companies. Each company will perform at least half a dozen missions, beginning in 2019. Having that many companies ready to send up supplies will also benefit the ISS in case of any accidents with the rockets like the kind that both SpaceX and Orbital ATK experienced in 2014. Keeping the contract for these non-manned flights is good news for SpaceX after getting the go-ahead to work on its manned missions for NASA, in competition with United Launch Alliance, but not SNC, which lost the contract last year.
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