In some respects I not suprize to see it happen. Though the
requirement was a little much for a lunar craft. Bit suprized they
dropped the requirement for unpressurized payload deliverly to ISS, but
it didn't say anything about deleting the ablity for pressurized
payload delivery.


http://www.aviationnow.com/avnow/new...s/CEV01126.xml

NASA Drops Requirement For Methane Engine From CEV
By Frank Morring
01/12/2006 08:38:34 AM

Congressional pressure to avoid a gap in U.S. human space access is
behind a NASA push to accelerate the first piloted flight of the
planned Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV).

While President Bush originally wanted an operation CEV by 2014, the
final RFP for the shuttle replacement called for a first flight with
crew "as close to 2010 as possible, but no later than 2012, without
compromising safety." The new document also drops requirements for a
LOX/methane engine on the CEV service module as a placeholder for
future extraction of the fuel from the atmosphere of Mars, and for
delivery of unpressurized cargo to the International Space Station,
although nothing would prevent the winning team from proposing them,
according to a program spokesman at Johnson Space Center.

Officially a "call for improvements" to the original CEV bids, the
long-awaited document specifies for the first time that the vehicle
will be "an improved, blunt-body crew capsule shape" as called for in
the exploration architecture released last fall (Aviation Week & Space
Technology, Sept. 26, 2005). Final CEV dimensions remain in flux, the
program spokesman says.

Teams led by Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin are finalists for the
job of building the CEV, which will run through 2019. The contract will
fall into three parts - a cost-plus award fee element through
"approximately 2013" that will cover design, development, test and
evaluation (DDT&E) though first flight of the initial two CEV blocks;
an indefinite quantity indefinite delivery contract for full-scale CEV
production, and a sustaining engineering element that will include "any
additional DDT&E necessary to complete development of the Block 2 Lunar
variant."

Just my $0.02

Space Cadet

derwetzelsDASHspacecadetATyahooDOTcom


Moon Society - St. Louis Chapter

http://www.moonsociety.org/chapters/stlouis/

There is only one (maybe 2) basic core reasons for humans to go
beyond LEO, That is for the establishment of space settlements or a
space based civilization. Everything else are details.

Gary Gray 11/9/2005