NASA Programs
Commercial Crew Program
U.S. industry flies NASA astronauts to the ISS from American soil again.
After the Shuttle retired in 2011, NASA astronauts reached the ISS only aboard Russian Soyuz spacecraft. The Commercial Crew Program contracted U.S. companies to design, build and operate crewed vehicles to restore domestic access to the station.
SpaceX’s Crew Dragon and Boeing’s Starliner were selected. Demo-2 in May 2020 carried Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley to the ISS—the first crewed orbital launch from U.S. soil since 2011. Operational Crew Dragon flights followed, beginning with Crew-1 in November 2020. Boeing’s Starliner completed its first crewed flight test later in the decade after uncrewed test flights.
Commercial Crew changed the economics and cadence of ISS access. NASA buys seats as a customer; the providers own and operate the spacecraft. The model is now a template for cargo and future deep-space services as well.
Milestones
- 2010Program formalized — NASA advances commercial crew partnerships to replace Shuttle access to the ISS.
- 2020-05-30Demo-2 — Crew Dragon carries Behnken and Hurley to the ISS from Launch Complex 39A.
- 2020-11-15Crew-1 — The first operational Commercial Crew rotation launches on a Falcon 9.
Summary original to flyARIA.com. Photograph: NASA/Joel Kowsky. NASA images are generally not protected by copyright in the United States; credit does not imply endorsement.