NASA awards space cargo handling contract to Leidos Innovations

Leidos Innovations Corp. has won a cost-plus-award-free contract from NASA to provide pressurized cargo packing and unpacking for the International Space Station Program.    Leidos Innovations Corp. has won a cargo handling contract from NASA to provide pressurized cargo packing and unpacking for the International Space Station Program, NASA said.
   The cost-plus-award-free contract, dubbed Cargo Mission Contract 3 (CMC3), has an indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity element.
   The contract’s phase-in period is scheduled to commence Jan. 2, 2018 and is followed by a two-year base period, one two-year option, one 18-month option and one one-year option, all of which can be exercised at NASA’s discretion.
   The maximum potential value of the contract, including all options, stands at $159 million.
   “Work under CMC3 includes sustaining engineering for flight crew equipment, pressurized cargo packing and transport hardware, non-integrated ancillary system hardware, simple payload facilities, and payload support items for deliveries to and from the space station,” NASA said.
   “The contract scope also includes determining the most efficient way to pack manifested cargo, verifying the adequacy of the cargo carriers, physically packing pressurized cargo into sub-carriers, shipping cargo to the Next Level Integrators and returning the cargo to the providers upon return,” NASA added. “Additionally, the contract provides NASA the means to build, modify, or re-certify hardware, as needed, to support cargo transport, flight crew equipment, ancillary system hardware, simple payload facility hardware and simple payload support items requirements.”