SpaceX CEO Elon Musk.
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SpaceX has won a $1.4 billion NASA contract to send more astronauts and cargo to the ISS.
Overall, NASA has awarded SpaceX 14 missions, bringing the total contract value to nearly $5 billion.
It’s a modification to the existing contract which NASA first awarded to SpaceX in 2014.
NASA announced on Wednesday it has awarded Elon Musk’s SpaceX a contract worth $1.4 billion for five more astronaut missions to the International Space Station.
The American space agency said in a press release the missions are intended to transport crew to the International Space Station under its Commercial Crew program.
It modifies the existing Commercial Crew contract which NASA initially awarded to SpaceX in 2014. Under the contract, SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft and Falcon 9 rocket are set to send cargo and up to four astronauts to the space station, NASA said.
The five additional flights means SpaceX has overall won 14 missions from NASA, bringing the total value of the contract to nearly $5 billion. The aerospace company is currently on its fourth operational NASA mission called Crew-4, which launched in April and is still in orbit.
The updated contract now means SpaceX will provide transportation services for the Crew-10, Crew-11, Crew-12, Crew-13, and Crew-14 missions.
The deal “allows NASA to maintain an uninterrupted US capability for human access to the space station until 2030,” the agency said in the statement.
NASA also awarded Boeing six missions to fly astronauts to the ISS under the Commercial Crew program, even though the Seattle aerospace firm hasn’t yet managed to launch its Starliner spacecraft. It aims to get it off the ground in early 2023, NASA officials have said, per CNN.
Despite various technical issues in recent years, NASA expects to continue using the ISS through 2030. There were reports that the agency is planning to crash the ISS into the ocean by January 2031.