Excalibur Almaz

Excalibur Almaz is a private spaceflight company which plans to provide a variety of deep space crewed exploration missions, micro-gravity science, and payload delivery. EA also aims to offer Low Earth Orbit cargo and crew delivery and return.^[1]

As of 2012 plans, design and flight safety reviews were planned for 2015.^[2] According to a 2012 interview with Art Dula, the chairman of Excalibur Almaz, the Excalibur Almaz capsule was supposedly at a "very high level of technical readiness" and could be flown within two to three years. The main issue of the first manned flight of the Excalibur Almaz capsule is regulatory, according to Dula, as the VA capsule had already completed nine unmanned test flights during the Almaz program, all of which were successful.^[3] The company has entered into an unfunded Space Act Agreement with NASA as part of the Commercial Crew Development Round 2 (CCDev2) activities in 2011 ^[4] but was not selected to receive funding under any phases of it.^[5]

Drawing of the Excalibur Almaz spacecraft – the service module (lower left) will be based on Astrium's ATV design according to Art Dula, the chairman of Excalibur Almaz.^[6]

History

In 2009, Excalibur Almaz hoped to begin flights by 2012 with revenue flights starting as early as 2013.^[7][8]

Concept illustration depicting the Excalibur Almaz Cislunar Spaceflight configuration.

As of January 2012, Excalibur Almaz updated its mission service offerings to include lunar and deep space capabilities. Based on independent market studies, these missions beyond Low Earth Orbit will provide the best business opportunity for commercial space transportation companies. Because of these more ambitious service offerings, Excalibur Almaz has pushed back its first launch to 2015.^[2]

In June 2012, Excalibur Almaz signed an agreement with XCOR Aerospace for suborbital familiarization and flight training services.^[9]

Company

Excalibur Almaz is based in Douglas, Isle of Man, with offices in Houston and Moscow.

In October, 2011, NASA signed an unfunded Space Act Agreement for work related to the Commercial Crew Development program. Details have not yet been released.^[10] In July 2012, Excalibur Almaz Inc. (EAI) successfully completed its Commercial Crew Development Round 2 (CCDev2) partnership with NASA's Commercial Crew Program.^[11]

Jonathan Clark, NASA flight surgeon on six Space Shuttle missions—and whose wife, Laurel Clark, died in the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster on shuttle mission STS-107—is a consultant on spacesuit and crew biological environment design for Excalibur Almaz.^[12]

Operations

Spacecraft

Excalibur Almaz is designing a spacecraft based on the VA capsule hull from the TKS spacecraft. The VA is a space capsule from the Soviet space program, originally designed for the military Almaz space station program. The needed development of propulsion systems for the VA capsule was reportedly delegated to an then undisclosed European organization as early as 2009.^[13] While the needed service module for an Excalibur Almaz capsule would superficially resemble the FGB of the TKS spacecraft, it is based on Astrium's ATV design according to Art Dula, the chairman of Excalibur Almaz.^[6]

The VA capsule of a TKS spacecraft.

Drawing of a TKS spacecraft – the VA capsule is the conical section on the left.

The Zvezda ISS Service module (DOS-8) is based on an Almaz-OPS hull and similarly sized as a potential Excalibur Almaz space station.

The potential Excalibur Almaz stations will use two hulls from the Almaz space station program. An Almaz derived hull is still in use on the Zvezda ISS service module (DOS-8) in the Russian Orbital Segment of the International Space Station; Thus the Excalibur Almaz stations would be distantly related to the similarly sized Zvezda module of the ISS.

The company’s Soviet-era spacecraft were moved from Russia to Excalibur Almaz facilities on the Isle of Man in early 2011. EA "plans to use the modules to provide extra room and supplies for the tourists and researchers it hopes to ferry into space."^[14] Excalibur Almaz’s two Salyut-class 29-ton space stations, each with a capacity of 95 cubic meters will serve as the heart of its lunar and deep space capabilities. The two spacecraft are equivalent to the Russian Mir core or the International Space Station Zvezda module. The Soviet-era electronics have been completely gutted and supposedly replaced with modern avionics supplied from an unnamed company.

By using modernized, tried-and-tested equipment rather than developing technology from scratch, the project is reportedly saving around $2 billion in development costs. The Russian Proton rocket, launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, is intended to be used to launch one of the spacecraft into space, where it will remain. Astronauts will use the Excalibur Almaz RRVs to get to and from the spacecraft.^[2]

Training

Excalibur Almaz has established a 2012 agreement with XCOR Aerospace to provide a suite of suborbital flight experiences as training milestones in preparation for orbital and trans-lunar missions.^[15]

Space launch services

In 2010, Excalibur Almaz partnered with Space Launch Services (SLS) to finance Sea Launch's preparations to emerge from Chapter 11 with $12 million (USD) of debtor-in-possession (DIP) financing to provide investment in a financial reorganization of Sea Launch. SLS earlier provided $12.5 million of DIP funds to Sea Launch in December 2009.^[16]

Company's problems

A secondhand Soviet-era space capsule that launched into space twice was set to be sold in Belgium on 2014-05-07. The Russian VA (Vozvraschaemyi Apparat, return vehicle) crew and cargo spacecraft was offered by the Berlin-based Lempertz auction house at its newly opened gallery in Brussels. The capsule was said to be the first historic spacecraft to be put up for sale in Europe. The VA capsule was sold to Excalibur Almaz (EA), a British company that planned to reuse the Soviet artifacts to offer commercial spaceflight services. In total, EA acquired four VA capsules and two Almaz (Salyut) modules in hopes of flying the combined spacecraft as a crew and cargo transportation system to the moon, the asteroids and deep space. The VA spacecraft being offered still bears the Excalibur Almaz name and logo, as well as the flags of Russia, the United Kingdom, the Isle of Man and the United States.^[17] It was sold to an anonymous bidder for 1 million euro.^[18]

In September, 2013 Dula, J. Buckner Hightower and Excalibur Almaz Ltd. were brought to court under the charges of fraud of $300.000 for the planned asteroid mining project. The case ended with conciliation in January, 2014.^[19]

In November 2014 Art Dula, Dula's law office associate Anat Friedman, his business partner J. Buckner Hightower, The Robert A. and Virginia Heinlein Prize Trust, Excalibur Limited, Excalibur Almaz Limited and Excalibur Almaz USA Inc were all sued by Japanese entrepreneur Takafumi Horie for fraud. The amount mentioned was $49 million, allegedly provided by Takafumi to run the company. It is alleged that some of the money was spent to buy soviet hardware, which, as the businessman states, turned out to be "museal specimens", some was also spent to transfer some of the money into Dula own name. Other alleged irregularities included reducing Takafumi shareholding percentage.^[19]

In March, 2015 one of the two hulls of Soviet-built Almaz space stations, along with the remaining VA capsule, was shipped to the Isle of Man’s seaport.^[20] The destination of the hardware remained unknown.

Sources

• Siddiqi, Asif A., The Almaz Space Station Complex: A History. 1964-1992, part 1, JBIS, Vol 54, No 11/12, November/December 2001.
• Excalibur Almaz Limited AAS Presentation, 16 November 2005
• Dr. Jamie Floyd, Assessment of the Almaz Capsule for Space Station Assured Crew Return (ACRV), McDonnell Douglas Aerospace MDC 97W5151, January 1997.

References

External links

• Grahn, Sven. ‘’The Almaz Space Station Complex’’
• Wade, Mark. ‘’Almaz’’
• Russian Space Web. ‘’The Almaz Program’’