Utah Company hopes to land $500 million NASA contract for Liberty Rocket

A high-stakes competition will climax Friday that has nothing to do with the Olympics. The gold medal in this competition is $500 million in federal funding to help a Utah company develop the next generation of manned space-launch vehicles.

Workers at ATK (Alliant Techsystems Inc.) will hear an early morning announcement by NASA on contracts that could set in motion years of development of ATK's proposed Liberty rocket at the Utah site.

At least four companies are involved in the battle for NASA funding. It would pay for the next 21 months of design and development of a "commercial crew vehicle."

NASA hopes to use commercial vehicles developed and owned by private companies to lift astronauts into orbit and deliver them to the International Space Station. Currently, the United States has no vehicle to perform that function so NASA astronauts are hitching rides on Russian rockets. Deseret News