NASA has awarded SpaceX the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) Mission. Additional information on the award can be found here, and the following statement can be attributed to Gwynne Shotwell, President and Chief Operating Officer at SpaceX:
“SpaceX is proud to continue our successful partnership with NASA in support of this important interplanetary mission. This award underscores NASA’s confidence in Falcon 9’s capability to perform critical science missions while providing the best launch value in the industry.”
SpaceX has a record-breaking, proven operational cadence, demonstrating its rapid, responsive, and reliable launch capability. To date, Falcon 9 has completed 68 launches, including two NASA LSP missions Jason-3 and TESS, 16 Dragon Cargo Resupply Services missions to and from the International Space Station, and this year Falcon 9 will help return human spaceflight capabilities to the United States for the first time since the Space Shuttle program ended in 2011. In addition to DART, SpaceX’s future launch manifest includes NASA LSP missions SWOT and Sentinel-6A.