ISS R&D Conference, July 2015
The American Astronautical Society organized the 4th International Space Station Research and Development (ISS R&D) conference that was held on July 7-9, 2015 in Boston, MA. In an on-stage interview by NASA ISS Program Manager Mike Suffredini on the first day, SpaceX founder Elon Musk discussed the status of the investigation of the Falcon 9 launch failure that occurred on June 28, 2015, destroying a Dragon spacecraft loaded with supplies for the ISS. Suffredini reassured conference attendees, who are users of the ISS, that the space station remains healthy despite the loss of that and two other cargo missions in the past eight months. Separately, NASA’s Bill Gerstenmaier stressed that the ISS does have a finite lifetime and it is time to plan for whatever will come after it. SpacePolicyOnline.com published a summary of that first day of the conference on July 7, 2015.