WASHINGTON -- NASA chose Lockheed Martin yesterday to build the spacecraft they hope will return Americans to the moon and take future explorers to Mars.
Under a contract that could total $8.15 billion, the aerospace giant will develop a capsule-shaped vehicle similar in appearance to the one that took an earlier generation of astronauts to the moon during Apollo. NASA hopes to use the vehicle, named Orion, to get back to the moon by 2020 and then set sail for Mars.
"Space is no longer going to be a destination that we visit briefly," said Scott J. Horowitz, associate administrator of NASA's exploration systems mission directorate.
Bethesda-based Lockheed Martin won the contract over another team led by Northrop Grumman and Boeing Co. The deal extends through 2019 and is divided into three stages. The first phase is estimated to cost $3.9 billion; the second, $3.5 billion; and the final stage, $750 million.
Orion, also known as the Crew Exploration Vehicle, or CEV, will be able to hold six passengers for flights to the International Space Station and four astronauts for the moon and Mars missions.
"We are delighted and honored to be a part of the NASA team," said John C. Karas, vice president of human spaceflight for Lockheed Martin. The team of subcontractors assembled by Lockheed Martin includes United Space Alliance, Honeywell, Hamilton Sundstrand and Orbital.
NASA centers nationwide, including the Kennedy Space Center, will have a role in the project.
The final assembly of Orion will take place at the Kennedy center. That translates into 300 new jobs for central Florida devoted to the Orion project, Lockheed Martin officials said.
Those jobs will help replace hundreds of positions expected to be lost when the space shuttle is retired from service in 2010.
Yesterday's announcement marks another milestone for NASA in its ambitious plan to return astronauts to the moon and visit Mars. The last time the space agency landed on the moon was in 1972, near the end of the Apollo program. NASA has been limited to low-Earth orbit in the three decades since.
The shuttle fleet has four years remaining before its planned retirement. The current schedule calls for the first manned flight of the Orion spacecraft by 2014.
Lockheed Martin will face pressure to help close that gap so the U.S. doesn't go four years without a ship that can carry people to orbit. After the announcement, Karas said the company aims to restart manned space flights before the 2014 deadline.
