SpaceX sent four astronauts to the International Space Station on Thursday, but the mission carried a distinctly business-minded subtext. The launch, designated Crew-13, was delayed from mid-September after an oxidizer leak traced to a valve in Dragon's propulsion system. SpaceX resolved the issue by cutting into a propellant line to swap the faulty component—a move the company's vice president of build and flight reliability, Bill Gerstenmaier, cited as evidence of SpaceX's commitment to fulfilling its NASA contract.
That contract is being extended even as SpaceX prepares to phase out the hardware flying it. NASA recently secured three additional crew missions in a $946 million extension, bringing the total agreement to 17 flights worth $5.92 billion. But with nine Crew Dragon flights still in the backlog, Gerstenmaier declined to say whether there is a hard cutoff for the program. The company plans to retire Crew Dragon and the Falcon 9 rocket around 2030, leaving the fleet well beyond halfway through its operational life.
SpaceX's future revenue, the source notes, is expected to come from Starlink broadband, the Starship/Super Heavy rocket, and orbital data centers—not ISS crew rotations. The company's success with Crew Dragon ended NASA's nine-year reliance on Russia for astronaut transport, but Boeing's Starliner has repeatedly stumbled. As SpaceX shifts toward more profitable lines of business, the Crew-13 mission may represent one of the last times NASA astronauts ride a Dragon to orbit under the current contract structure.