Sierra Nevada has announced that the company has successfully completed all milestones under NASA’s Commercial Crew Development 2 (CCDev2) phase. Milestones achieved include a systems requirement review, flight simulator development, creation of a vehicle avionics integration laboratory, system definition review, flight control integration laboratory, preliminary design review and the first free-flight test of the Dream Chaser mini-space shuttle, which which it is hoped to one day put humans into orbit and return them safely.
The final milestone, free-flight test was performed on 26 October 2013 at Edwards Air Force Base, California, in conjunction with NASA’s Dryden Flight Research Center. The objective of the milestone was to lift the Dream Chaser spacecraft via a carrier vehicle to its designated release conditions then release the spacecraft for an unpiloted free-flight test in order to collect trajectory and flight data during flight. NASA accepts that despite an anomaly with a collapsed undercarraige did not affect the results which was regarded as a very successful gliding approach and landing. As a result of the analysis, Si
Dream Chaser during first glide. Courtesy: Sierra Nevada Corp
erra Nevada received the $8 millilon full award value for the milestone.
