Jane Edwards
NASA plans to collaborate with SpaceX to use the company“™s Red Dragon unmanned spacecraft concept to send payloads designed for technology demonstrations to Mars, Space News reported Thursday.
Steve Jurczyk, associate administrator for NASA“™s space technology mission directorate, said at the Next-Generation Suborbital Researchers Conference that potential payloads could include resource utilization-based platforms that could potentially turn water on the Martian surface into potable water, oxygen, hydrogen or methane, Jeff Foust writes.
Jurczyk noted that NASA is unlikely to have a payload ready for SpaceX“™s planned 2018 Mars mission and that it would use such a mission to gain entry, descent and landing information under the modified Space Act Agreement.
“If they go in 2018, it“™s really going to be an EDL demo for us. We won“™t have any payloads available. But 2020 there“™s a possibility.“ he said.
Jim Green, chief of NASA“™s planetary science division, has said the agency plans to integrate the launch of its Mars lander ““ Insight ““ with SpaceX“™s Red Dragon in 2018, according to the report.
