SpaceX CEO Elon Musk discussed the present and future landing capability envisioned for the Crew Dragon.

“When we first created Dragon Version 1, we didn’t know how to create a spacecraft,” Musk said. “We’d never designed a spacecraft before … It’s a great spacecraft, and it was a great proof of concept. It showed us what it took to bring something back from orbit, which is a very difficult thing to do. Usually when something comes in from orbital velocity, it burns up in a big fireball. But going from Dragon Version 1, we wanted to take a big step in technology.”

SpaceX has been launching unmanned Dragon Version 1 capsules to the space station since 2012 using its Falcon 9 rockets. The company has flown three of 12 cargo missions to the station for NASA under a $1.6 billion deal. The Dragon V2 is SpaceX’s entry to fly NASA astronauts to the station as part of the U.S. space agency’s commercial crew program.

Rival aerospace companies Boeing and Sierra Nevada are also developing their own commercial space taxis as part of that competition. NASA’s commercial crew program is expected to make a decision on which vehicles to advance into the next selection phase by July or August, with the goal of a manned flight by 2017.

The new Dragon V2 is an updated version of the company’s robotic Dragon capsule — currently used to take cargo to the space station and bring materials back to Earth. At the moment, the Dragon is the only robotic cargo vessel that can bring supplies back to the planet from the station. (Another company, the Virginia-based Orbital Sciences, has a $1.9 billion contract to deliver station cargo, but its Cygnus vehicles are intentionally destroyed at mission’s end.)

SpaceX’s new spacecraft is designed to be reusable and it should be able to touchdown back on land with the accuracy of a helicopter, Musk added.

“That is how a 21st-century spaceship should land,” he said.

Unlike the unmanned version of the Dragon, which uses the station’s robotic arm to berth to the orbiting outpost, Version 2 will be able to autonomously dock to the space station. A pilot will also be able to park the spacecraft using manual controls if needed, Musk said.

Visit the original article to see an infographic of how the Crew Dragon landing capsule should work (but doesn’t yet).

At one time, the Crew Dragon design planned to land with boosters, in the manner of the Soyuz space capsule. At this time, it plans an intermediary step of a parachute landing in the ocean. To see a video about the Russian Soyuz capsule returning to earth, as a point of comparison, please visit the next page.