The long march of New Space revolutionaries passed a meaningful marker with Space Exploration Technologies' Falcon 9/ Dragon flight last week (see p. 35). The second for SpaceX's big launcher and its Dragon capsule, it was the first "revenue flight," carrying cargo in a vehicle intended one day to ferry people as well to and from low Earth orbit. That should start with astronauts to the International Space Station. NASA currently pays about $60 million per seat to fly astronauts to the station on Russia's venerable Soyuz.
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