WASHINGTON — Vast has signed an agreement with NASA to test its Haven-1 space station at an agency facility ahead of its launch next year.
Vast announced April 3 that it signed an agreement with NASA to conduct environmental testing of Haven-1 at the Neil Armstrong Test Facility in Ohio. That center, formerly known as Plum Brook Station, features facilities for thermal vacuum, acoustics, vibration and other tests.
“We’re thankful for NASA’s support to test the Haven-1 flight vehicle at this historical and world-renowned facility. It is a testament to the growing importance of Vast as a commercial destination partner,” Max Haot, chief executive of Vast, said in a statement.
The tests at Armstrong are scheduled to begin in early 2026, verifying the spacecraft can handle launch and in-space environments. Haven-1 is scheduled to launch no earlier than May 2026.
Vast revised the schedule for Haven-1, previously scheduled to launch in the second half of 2025, after completing tests of a structural qualification article of Haven-1 at a company facility in Mojave, California. Those tests, Vast said in February, confirmed the design of the module and also gave the company a better understanding of how long it would take to build the flight model.
Once Haven-1 is in orbit, the company plans to send up to four crews to the single-module station for short-duration stays. Vast plans to use Haven-1 to gain experience for Haven-2, a larger station it is proposing to NASA for its Commercial Low Earth Orbit Destinations, or CLD, program intended to foster development of commercial stations to succeed the International Space Station.
“We couldn’t even bid a credible Haven-2 design if we had not done all this work in design maturation for Haven-1,” Haot said in an interview in February, noting that the core module of Haven-2 will be a stretched version of the Haven-1 module with 80% to 90% common elements.
Vast is not part of the ongoing Phase 1 portion of the CLD program, where NASA is supporting Axiom Space, Blue Origin and Starlab Space on their space station concepts, but does have an unfunded Space Act Agreement with the agency for technical support. NASA expects to release a draft solicitation for Phase 2 of CLD in the summer and final version in the fall. Phase 2 will fund certification of commercial space stations for use by NASA and purchases of services from them.
Phase 2 will be open to all companies, not just those in Phase 1. NASA expects to make CLD Phase 2 awards in the summer of 2026.
