A giant leap in the commercial space exploration

"It is in every sense, is an important step for commercial space, which is like a giant leap," said Michael Lopez-Alegria, a former astronaut who now heads the Commercial Trade Organization Spaceflight Federation.
 
"We are on the edge of a grand historic milestone in space exploration," said the representative of NASA Administrator Lori Garver.

Start is set to 4:55 am by summer ET (EDT) on Saturday May 19 at Air Force Station in Cape Canaveral, Florida.

Since last summer, shuttles were abolished, NASA is heavily dependent on their countries - partners to deliver cargo and crew to the ISS, while it focuses on how to develop a new spacecraft that can fly beyond the orbit of the station.

SpaceX has built two versions of its rocket Falcon, the so-called capsule Dragon, who is going to run with its launch pad at Cape Canaveral, created for mission operations center and other support. In this spaceport invested approximately one billion dollars, one third of which came from NASA.

SpaceX launched its first Dragon capsule in December 2010 for a test flight around the planet. At this time, the company plans to reach the space station ISS.

"This is - a very ambitious mission," said Jeff Greason of XCOR Aerospace, the oldest lawyer in cases related to space exploration. "If they reach even half of their goals in the mission, and if they are successful, it will be considered as the beginning of a new era in space exploration."