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Liberty Launch Vehicle

Liberty Launch Vehicle

Liberty is a 2011 launch vehicle concept proposed to NASA by Alliant Techsystems (ATK) and Astrium under phase 2 of the NASA Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) program intended to stimulate development of privately operated crew vehicles to low Earth orbit.

The Liberty design proposal is a combination of hardware from the defunct Ares I project (the Five-segment version of the Space Shuttle Solid Rocket Booster for a first stage) and from the commercial Ariane 5 launcher (the Vulcain cryogenic main engine, which was slated to carry the Hermes (spacecraft), as a second stage). It is intended to be launched from Kennedy Space Center.

The launcher height is planned at 300 ft, is advertised at a price of $180 million per launch, and has a projected payload of 44,500 pounds to Low Earth orbit.

ATK has projected the first launch to take place as early as 2013, with astronauts launching by 2015.

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