The Crew Return Vehicle (CRV), sometimes referred to as the Assured Crew Return Vehicle (ACRV), is the proposed lifeboat or escape module for the International Space Station (ISS). A number of different vehicles and designs have been considered over the past two decades – with several flying as developmental test prototypes – but no one single design has been built as the dedicated CRV. In April 2010, President Obama directed NASA to develop a CRV based on the Orion technology.
In the original space station design, emergencies were intended to be dealt with by having a "safe area" on the station that the crew could evacuate to, pending a rescue from a U.S. Space Shuttle. However, the 1986 Space Shuttle Challenger disaster and the subsequent grounding of the shuttle fleet caused station planners to rethink this concept. Planners foresaw the need for a CRV to address three specific scenarios:
- Crew return if a space shuttle or Soyuz capsule was unavailable;
- An escape vehicle from a major time-critical space station emergency;
- Full or partial crew return in case of a medical emergency.
Read more about Crew Return Vehicle: Medical Considerations, Early NASA Concepts, European Space Agency Concepts, Lifeboat Alpha, X-38, Orbital Space Plane, Apollo-derivative Capsule, Soyuz TMA, Commercial Crew Development, Orion
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