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SpaceX CEO and chief designer Elon Musk
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is set to introduce the Dragon V2 at a media event from Hawthorne, California, on Thursday, May 29. The Dragon V2 is a "next generation spacecraft designed to carry astronauts into space," according to a news release.
For those can't attend in person, the event with be webcast live at this link, starting at 10:00 p.m. EDT.
Since NASA retired its space shuttle fleet in 2011, the agency has been entirely dependent on Russia's Soyuz spacecraft to get American astronauts to and from the space station. The U.S currently pays Russia around $71 million per person to get to space, according to The Washington Post. The need for private space taxis has become even more crucial as tensions between the U.S. and Russia continue to run high over the crisis in Ukraine.
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SpaceX's Dragon cargo ship.
"After analyzing the sanctions against our space industry, I suggest to the USA to bring their astronauts to the International Space Station using a trampoline," Russia's Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Roxine tweeted from his Russian-language account in April.
In response to those remarks, Musk tweeted: "Sounds like this might be a good time to unveil the new Dragon Mk 2 spaceship that @SpaceX has been working on with @NASA."
Space X is one of three companies competing for funding from NASA's Commercial Crew Transportation Capability program with the goal of developing a private space taxi that can carry U.S. crew to the space station by 2017.
Other competitors include Boeing, which recently released interior renderings for its manned space capsule named CST-100, and the Sierra Nevada Corporation, which has been designing the Dream Chaser. SpaceX may have a leg up on the competition since they've already successfully pitched and won a cargo contract with NASA for the original Dragon.