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NEWS
- August 1999: Andrews Space and Technology was awarded a
contract by Kelly Space & Technology to provide detailed design
engineering services for Kelly's NASA Space Transportation
Architecture Study Phase 3 effort.
Kelly
Space & Technology Wins $2.1 Million NASA Contract
SAN BERNARDINO, Calif.--(Sept. 22,
1999)--Kelly Space & Technology Inc. has been awarded a $2.1
million contract by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration
to continue work on the next phase of a study that will focus on the
development of space transportation through the year 2030.
Under the three-month contract, Kelly Space will develop approaches to
meet NASA's future space flight requirements from the year 2000
through the year 2030, while assuring safety, reliability and
substantial cost savings.
"Kelly Space's selection by NASA to participate in this
transportation architecture study is a very strong affirmation of our
company's mission to commercially provide the safest, most reliable,
cost efficient and responsive transportation to our customer's
orbits," said Bob Davis, the company's president/CEO.
Kelly Space is a commercial reusable space transportation systems
development and operations company, which was founded in 1993 by
Michael Kelly and Michael Gallo. The company has headquarters at the
San Bernardino International Airport, the former Norton Air Force
Base, in Southern California. Kelly Space is known for its patented,
commercially-funded, reusable Tow Launch Technology and Astroliner
reusable launch vehicle (RLV), which is under development.
NASA will incorporate Kelly Space's findings into its Integrated Space
Transportation Plan, which will be presented to the Office of
Management and Budget in Washington, D.C. around Oct. 1, and in an
update on Dec. 1. The plan is intended to identify and define NASA's
five-year investment strategy that will enable a low-risk, highly
competitive selection of a new space transportation architecture by
the year 2005.
According to Michael Kelly, Chairman of the Board and Chief Technical
Officer, "Kelly Space & Technology Inc. is pleased to have
been chosen as a prime contractor for NASA's Space Transportation
Architecture Study. STAS has been described as 'the future of NASA.'
We take the responsibility of making a comprehensive, objective
contribution to that future very seriously.
"As leader of a team of established and emerging aerospace firms,
we are committed to directly conveying the diverse ideas of our team
members," Kelly said, "and to synthesizing innovative
approaches at every opportunity. Kelly Space's experience in STAS
Phase II, and in leading the Commercial Space Transportation Advisory
Committee's Reusable Launch Vehicle Working Group, will prove
invaluable to this process."
Kelly is chairman of the COMSTAC RLV Working Group and an industry
representative on the COMSTAC, which meets bi-monthly in Washington,
D.C. to discuss flight safety and regulations for RLVs with the
Federal Aviation Administration and its Space Transportation
component.
"As a team, we are honored to be included in so important a
study," Kelly said, "and dedicate ourselves to providing the
best possible product to NASA."
Kelly Space has invited other RLV companies to join its team on this
contract to add their respective technological concepts and
entrepreneurial innovations to further NASA's objectives.
Participants on the Kelly Space team for this contract include:
Pioneer Rocketplane, Solvang, Calif.; HMX Inc., parent company of
Rotary Rocket, Reno, Nev.; and Universal Space Lines (USL), Newport,
Calif., founded by the late astronaut Pete Conrad. USL also will
handle operations technology on the contract.
United Space Alliance, of Houston, Texas, which is responsible for
operations of the current Space Shuttle for NASA, will provide its
Shuttle operations expertise to the Kelly Space team on the contract.
Other firms Kelly Space has selected to be on its team for this
contract include: TRW Strategic Systems Division with offices in San
Bernardino, Calif., ground and flight operations support; ECON Inc.,
Huntington Beach, Calif., cost analysis; Andrews Space &
Technology Inc., El Segundo, Calif., detail design and engine support;
Griffin Consulting, Kettering, Ohio, aircraft systems design and
attendant program management expertise; MPD, a San-Diego, Calif.-based
aerospace systems engineering firm, systems level analysis; Raven
Aerospace, Houston, Texas, safety and reliability relating to human
rating of vehicles; and Digital Empire, an animation and visualization
firm based in Riverside, Calif., communications integration for
project deliverables and multimedia presentations.
Program manager for Kelly Space's STAS Phase III contract is Jim
Hollopeter. He also managed the company's STAS Phase II contract.
Aerospace consultant Bill Strobl, a former vice president of General
Dynamics, is again the technology lead. Marc T. Constantine,
president/CEO of Kelly Aerospace, a wholly owned subsidiary of Kelly
Space, will oversee rocket engine technologies on the contract. Kelly
Aerospace is responsible for the design, development and production of
the Astroliner.
Under this contract, Kelly Space is working on five objectives for
NASA. They are:
- Assure continued and improved safety of the Shuttle through
implementation of safety driven Shuttle upgrades;
- Develop critical technologies to enable significant increase in the
safety and reliability, and reduce the cost of second generation
launch systems;
- Flight validate Space Transportation technologies to mitigate
development costs and technical performance risk;
- Prepare for a competitive selection between Shuttle derived and new
design second generation RLV concepts; and
- Develop revolutionary technology for third generation RLV concepts
to achieve safety and reliability comparable to commercial airlines.
Last September, Kelly Space was awarded a $1 million contract by NASA
to perform a STAS to develop approaches to meet NASA's future human
space flight requirements with significant reductions in cost.
Kelly Space concluded in its report that NASA could save an estimated
$10 billion over the life of the International Space Station, starting
in 2006, by having an Astroliner derivative and separate crew and
cargo modules take over the Space Shuttle's space station resupply and
crew transfer duties.
According to Michael Gallo, executive vice president and chief
operating officer, "This new contract from NASA integrates well
into our current and future technology development activities. Kelly
Space is proceeding with its incremental development program, and
continues to make steady progress on sub-scale vehicle configurations
and highly innovative propulsion system technology developments, all
of which support Kelly Space's family of vehicles."
Two grants awarded earlier this year to Kelly Space from the State of
California Trade and Commerce Agency are helping to advance the
company's RLV development efforts. In April, Kelly Space won a Highway
to Space grant of nearly $200,000 from the Western Commercial Space
Center by the state agency's Office of Strategic Technology to
identify and assess candidate spaceport sites within California from
which to base and operate RLVs.
In June, Kelly Space was awarded a California Space Flight Technology
grant of $150,000 to begin developing a Systems Integration Laboratory
to initially define software requirements for the company's Astroliner
RLV. This grant is administered through the California Space and
Technology Alliance, the state's designated Spaceport Authority.
As Kelly Space's flagship vehicle, the piloted Astroliner will provide
a cargo delivery service centered initially around deployment of
satellites, and, in later generation vehicles, enabling the general
public to travel in space.
With Kelly Space's Tow Launch Technology, the company will use a
modified Boeing 747 to tow the Astroliner from conventional airports
anywhere around the globe to its "launch site" at 20,000
feet of altitude. The Astroliner is capable of taking a 10,000 lb.
payload into Low Earth Orbit.
Kelly Space successfully demonstrated its Tow Launch Technology during
all six flight demonstrations conducted with NASA's Dryden Flight
Research Center and the Air Force Flight Test Center at Edwards Air
Force Base in Edwards, Calif. The demonstrations were conducted in
December 1997 through February 1998 under a Small Business Innovation
Research contract awarded by the Air Force Research Laboratory.
For more information, contact Kelly Space & Technology, Inc. at
(909) 382-2010 or by e-mail at kstadmin@kellyspace.com.
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