Orion Passes Phase 1 Safety Review

This vehicle will take NASA astronauts BEO someday.

Mark my words.

Pity Ares 1 is only designed to take Dragon sized capsules to LEO.

So... How much money do we have in this capsule now?

Kudos and congratulations to Lockheed Martin, its subs and the NASA Safety Teams for this hard won milestone. The process to rate a space vehicle to safely transport humans is a painstaking process that must evaluate every single aspect of a space mission, and to accomplish this concurrently with the development and designing of the vehicle is a great accomplishment. All the controls to hazards that must be in place during the design phase of a vehicle are subjected to intense scrutiny and must adhere to NASA's strict requirements for safety and mission assurance. This is only the first part of a three Phase process, but it is the most difficult. Great work!!

Well, there is enough money in it to make it much further along (and safer) than a manned Dragon capsule. But there is room for both vehicles in space; especially since Dragon is privately funded, right? Orion has a scheduled (and realistic) launch date of 2014.

I think that a more appropriate question is: How far away from being flyable is it?

If Orion can be brought to readiness in less than five years (on an EELV-Heavy rather than the underpowered and expensive Ares-I), then I suspsect that it could beat the two commercial vehicles in development to LEO.

"Pity Ares 1 is only designed to take Dragon sized capsules to LEO"

Wow, I wish I could get paid for correcting the Ares-haters.

Ares I has plenty of performance to lift Orion to orbit as demonstrated in the Constellation PDR. The challenge is to get the Orion crew module mass down so it can land safely on its 'chutes. Up-mass isn't he problem, down-mass is.

Pity Falcon 9 is only designed to take Dragon sized capsules to LEO.

Ares I has plenty of performance to lift Orion to orbit as demonstrated in the Constellation PDR. The challenge is to get the Orion crew module mass down so it can land safely on its 'chutes. Up-mass isn't he problem, down-mass is.

If the parachute is too small or does not fit then the Orion is not safe and should not have passed its safety review.

Also 3 stages to orbit on a 2 stage rocket is not plenty of performance.

"Orion has a scheduled (and realistic) launch date of 2014."

Its taken 6 years (NASA and Contractor time) to get through PDR and this first stage of the SR process. Augustine and Aerospace Corp said 2017 was a possibility. 2019 was more realistic. Based on schedule to date, I would not bet on better dates than these.

It is unfortunate that decisions were made on the size and mass of Orion that allowed no other options for launch vehicles or for ground landing; it is simply exemplary of the poor decisions being made. A team is now working to take a look at whether a smaller Orion using some of the existing work could be readied faster. If I were NASA I'd have to reopen the competition to other bidders since this would be a new vehicle.

Not certain how best to respond Moonman, other than to say that the physical size of Orion is not geting smaller, but because of the President's budget and termination liability, some internal systems are having to be deferred until after the flight tests Orion 1 and Orion 2. 2014 is on the schedule today and is do-able provided Lockheed is allowed to do their work without additional distractions. And to Swallow, Pad Abort 1 showed plenty of performance margin for the chutes. Cessna is correct in that this vehicle will go beyond LEO. I know this is not what the CxP haters want to believe, but it will happen.
P.S. Everyone that I know in CxP want Musk to succeed. It is just a shame that we are not extended the same courtesy and respect for what we believe.

If I understand what you are saying, LM is proceeding with all due haste to develop something that could be capable of flying in space in 2014. It apparently would have flight test capabilities but would not be fully functional owing to its missing systems. If that is true that the big thing missing appears to be a suitable launch vehicle.