Project Constellation

As the Shuttle returned to flight following the loss of STS-107, initial definition was well under way on the new Project Constellation space vehicles, intended to fulfil President Bush Junior’s vision of returning humans to the lunar surface and then moving on to a human landing on Mars. The Constellation hardware consisted of two launch vehicles and two spacecraft. The Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV), later named the “Orion” spacecraft, would be launched by the Crew Launch Vehicle (CLV), renamed the “Ares-I”. The Lunar Surface Access Module (LSAM), “Altair”, and its heavy-lift launch vehicle, called “Ares-V” are currently of no relevance to the future ISS flight programme and are therefore not reviewed in this volume.