Former Momentus executive Fred Kennedy to lead startup focused on nuclear-powered rocket engines

Kennedy states nuclear thermal propulsion will aid accelerate the advancement of the lunar economy

WASHINGTON — Fred Kennedy, a former Pentagon official and veteran area govt, introduced March 22 he is major a new startup to commercialize nuclear thermal rocket propulsion. 

The startup, named Dark Fission Room Methods, “aims to accelerate the growth of the house overall economy further than low Earth orbit by the progress and deployment of the very first commercially out there nuclear thermal rocket engine,” he explained.

Kennedy said developments in the room and production industries make it possible to “produce a harmless and reputable in-place propulsion functionality with functionality properties exceeding everything readily available nowadays.”

For house functions further than Earth’s orbit, since of the enormous distances involved, existing propulsion methods are typically possibly inefficient or incredibly gradual, mentioned Kennedy. Nuclear thermal rockets could supply brief transit times and superior fuel economic climate.

Kennedy was formerly president of the room expert services firm Momentus and vice president of launch companies service provider Astra. Prior to that, he was director of the Protection Department’s Area Advancement Agency and director of the Defense Sophisticated Study Initiatives Agency’s Tactical Technological innovation Place of work. 

Although at DARPA from 2017 to 2019, Kennedy reported, he begun the agency’s nuclear area propulsion program identified as DRACO, short for Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Functions.

Dark Fission will seek out governing administration and field associates to go after the on-orbit demonstration of an operational nuclear thermal rocket engine within the up coming five decades, said Kennedy. “We’re concentrated on delivering a professional capability initially and foremost, but we won’t rule out work on behalf of the federal federal government.”

He thinks the technological innovation could be applied for orbital transfer and lunar accessibility services or by “anyone with an interest in deploying their gear immediately and effectively to geosynchronous orbit or past.”

Dark Fission co-founders are previous vice president of Room Micro Michael Jacox and space entrepreneur Gregory Loboda.

“We have possible buyers and we are operating now to protected cash,” Kennedy advised SpaceNews.

A professional entrant into the nuclear propulsion rocket arena “may nicely be the stabilizing ingredient that has lengthy been lacking,” he claimed. “We want a strong, sustained drive to get this functionality to orbit, and enlisting the assistance of the private sector is what I imagine will last but not least carry a nuclear thermal rocket to current market.”