A spacecraft with a Soviet past abandoned a rocket with RD-180 and is going to the moon
At the heart of the Dream Chaser ship, the brainchild of Sierra Nevada Corporation, is the idea of a space plan, implying that when it returns to Earth, the device does not make a parachute landing, but plans and lands like a Shuttle or a Buran.
Soviet heritage
Dream Chaser has very interesting roots: the design of the ship was made with an eye on the Soviet Bor-4 project. The developers do not particularly hide this. Moreover, according to Mark Cirangelo, CEO of SpaceDev (she is the "daughter" of Sierra Nevada), in the beginning of the 2000's he met with the engineers who created the Soviet apparatus. Cirangelo claims that his interlocutors were extremely surprised that the elements of their project received a second life abroad.
At the same time, Dream Chaser is not a complete copy of the Soviet spacecraft. This is a completely independent product, for the developers of which Bor-4 has become a muse, an inspiration.
It is assumed that the American spacecraft will have to land on large runways that can serve ordinary heavy passenger aircraft. Such flexibility, along with the use of non-toxic fuels in aircraft, should allow Dream Chaser to land on runways around the world.
Dream Chaser can deliver up to 5,5 tons of cargo into orbit. It may also become the second ship, after Dragon from SpaceX, capable of returning cargo from the ISS back to Earth. According to the project, he will be able to return about 1,8 tons. A huge plus of the project is that, thanks to landing on GDP, it will be possible to unload the device almost immediately, which can be critically important for a number of biological experiments.
The ship consists of two parts: the spacecraft itself and the service-cargo module: it is installed in the stern. The Dream Chaser has folding wings: thanks to this design, it can be launched inside the rocket fairing.
In 2016, the spacecraft developer, SpaceDev (she is the "daughter" of Sierra Nevada), together with two other companies, won a tender for the delivery of goods to the International Space Station.
In addition to flying to the ISS, Dream Chaser can also provide cargo transportation to low Earth orbit, 160-2000 kilometers above the planet's surface.
Ambitious goals
However, the company has set itself more ambitious goals. In 2014, she lost the contest for the delivery of astronauts to the ISS. Despite the defeat, the company continues to develop a manned version of its spacecraft.
Steve Lindsay, vice president of the company and a former astronaut, claims that the design of the passenger version on the 85% coincides with the cargo, although the first will require additional safety tests. In addition, SpaceDev intends to offer its NASA ship to supply the lunar orbital station, which is supposed to launch to the Earth satellite in the second half of the 2020's
Since the 2007 year, it was assumed that the Dream Chaser will be launched into space using Atlas 5 rockets equipped with the Russian RD-180 engine. However, the other day, Sierra Nevada Corporation announced that the launch of the cargo spaceplane will be carried out using the Vulcan rocket, which is still under development.
The first flight of the Vulcan rocket should take place in 2021 year. Then the heir to the Soviet space industry should also go into space. Based on this, it can be judged that the space planes will nevertheless make part of the flights using Atlas 5.
Information