Your editorial [“Gambling with Human Spaceflight,” Sept. 14, page 26] notwithstanding, embracing growing industrial capabilities for human spaceflight isn’t a gamble or even far-fetched. After all, such “outsourcing” of astronaut transport to low Earth orbit began more than a decade ago when Rockwell and Lockheed Martin consolidated their spaceflight operations teams into the United Space Alliance. Of course, since they operate a very fragile system for NASA, it’s done on a cost-plus fixed-fee basis.
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