Elon Musk Confirms Crucial SpaceX Crew Dragon Test Set For December

Elon Musk-led SpaceX's new Crew Dragon capsule test could happen in December. The plan for the uncrewed in-flight abort (IFA) test has been confirmed by the company founder and CEO Elon Musk.

Crew Dragon was started in 2014 under a $2.6 billion contract with NASA as part of its Commercial Crew Program. It has been fast-tracked this year after lingering delays.

The SpaceX launch of the IFA test is vital to examine Crew Dragon's worthiness for the operational flight.

“Hard to say with high accuracy, but 4 to 6 weeks is my best guess” Musk tweeted on Oct. 29, in response to a Twitter follower’s query about an IFA target date.

In the run-up to the test, SpaceX has installed eight SuperDraco abort engines that will take out the capsule away from the Falcon 9 rocket in the event of an emergency, per SpaceX news.

During the upcoming uncrewed in-flight abort (IFA) test, the SuperDracos will show their prowess while lifting off from Florida's Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.

Crew Dagon urgent for NASA

NASA administrator recently said it wanted Crew Dragon to be ready for formal launch by early next year.

For NASA, the commissioning of Crew Dragon is urgent as it has been relying on Russian Soyuz spacecraft to ferry its astronaut to the International Space Station (ISS).

This followed the U.S space agency grounding its space shuttle program in 2011, per NASA news.

Soyuz charges a whopping $85 million per seat from NASA yet it can only carry three astronauts. But Crew Dragon and Starliner can accommodate seven crew members.

Crew Dragon unscrewed test was successful

Crew Dragon has already done a trip to the ISS in an uncrewed journey called Demo-1 on March 2.

It came back to Earth six days later. But the capsule perished in April during a series of engine tests on the ground and delayed the planned IFA test of in-flight abort.

According to SpaceX, the burn out of the capsule was caused by a problem in the faulty valve in the abort-engine system and it has now set safeguards to prevent its recurrence.

If the new IFA test goes well, SpaceX will fly Demo-2 mission carrying NASA astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken to the ISS and bring them back from the orbiting lab.

Modern reusable rockets and DC-X of NASA

Meanwhile, reports said the concept of vertical launch and landing of modern rockets hyped today essentially belongs to the concepts pioneered by DC-X of NASA.

The Delta Clipper Experimental or DC-X took birth in the early 1990s when the reusability of rockets was just a dream.

SpaceX and Blue Origin have modeled their rockets harping on reusability unlike the old pattern of dumping them into the ocean.

But the futuristic spacecraft of NASA DC-X ended its life in a huge explosion on a launchpad.