The Dream Chaser space plane continues to make closer steps towards flight even though it wasn't chosen by NASA to ferry astronauts to and from the International Space Station. Sierra Nevada Corporation recently checked off a milestone laid out in the company's last commercial-crew contract with NASA, which was signed in 2012 even though they weren't funded for the final phase of the project while NASA gave the funding to SpaceX and Boeing to provide astronaut taxis. They recently just passed milestone 15a which validates their performance and safety, while decreasing the risk for this critical propulsion system. The goal of the Commercial Crew Program is to restart launches of astronauts from U.S. soil, a practice which was suspended in 2011 when the space shuttle retired. Current International Space Station crews launch with Russian Soyuz spacecraft, which leaves Earth from Kazakhstan. It is inspiring to see the Sierra Nevada is still making progress towards their goal even though they haven't received the funding from NASA. Also, they filed a protest to the GAO, which was denied, concerning the award of CCtCap.
http://www.space.com/28203-dream-chaser-space-plane-propulsion-milestone.html
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