NASA and the Private Sector - Page 204

The U.S. Court of Federal Claims ruled against Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin in the company’s lawsuit versus NASA over a lucrative astronaut lunar lander contract awarded to Elon Musk’s SpaceX earlier this year.

Federal judge Richard Hertling sided with the defense in his ruling, completing a months-long battle after Blue Origin sued NASA in August.

Blue Origin, NASA, and SpaceX did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the ruling.

Musk, in a tweet responding to CNBC’s report on the ruling, posted a photo from the 1995 movie “Judge Dredd.”



NASA in April awarded SpaceX with the sole contract for the agency’s Human Landing System program under a competitive process. Worth $2.9 billion, the SpaceX contract will see the company use its Starship rocket to deliver astronauts to the moon’s surface for NASA’s upcoming Artemis missions.

SpaceX was competing with Blue Origin and Dynetics for what was expected to be two contracts, before NASA only awarded a single contract due to a lower-than-expected allocation for the program from Congress.

Blue Origin quickly protested the decision with the U.S. Government Accountability Office, but the GAO in late July denied the company’s appeal – leading Bezos’ space company to escalate its legal action.

A redacted version of Blue Origin’s lawsuit revealed the company’s complaint focused on proving that NASA wrongly awarded to only SpaceX and “disregarded key flight safety requirements” in the process.

Hertling’s ruling dismissed Blue Origin’s claims. The court’s opinion is currently sealed, as the case contains information proprietary to the companies, but the parties were ordered by Hertling to deliver proposed redactions by Nov. 18, to publicly release the opinion.

NASA’s work with SpaceX on the HLS contract was halted during the lawsuit but is scheduled to resume on Monday.

Cape Canaveral, Fla. (AP) -- High wind off the Florida coast has prompted SpaceX to delay the return of four space station astronauts in orbit since spring.

The U.S., French and Japanese astronauts were supposed to leave the International Space Station on Sunday, with their capsule splashing down in the Gulf of Mexico on Monday morning. But with gusts exceeding safety limits, SpaceX bumped the departure to Monday afternoon, with a nighttime return to conclude their six-month mission.

The good news is that their trip home will now last eight hours, less than half as long as before. The toilet in their capsule is broken, and so the four will need to rely on diapers while flying home.

SpaceX still is aiming for a Wednesday night launch, at the earliest, of their replacements. This flight also has been delayed by bad weather, as well as an astronaut's undisclosed medical issue. The issue, described as minor, should be resolved by launch time, officials said.

Last week, SpaceX and NASA flipped the order of the launch and landing because of the deteriorating weather and the looming deadline to get the capsule back from the space station. SpaceX capsules are certified for a maximum 210 days in orbit, and the one up there now is approaching 200 days.