A SUCCESSFUL LAUNCH of the privately owned space ship in california

POSTED BY: ScottishBrownCoat
UPDATED: Thursday, July 1, 2004 22:34
VIEWED: 10704
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SCOTTISHBROWNCOAT

Monday, June 21, 2004 3:50 PM

HELL YEAH!!!

History has been made today Browncoats, the First privately owned spaceship hit orbit and landed successfully today.

I looked at the news networks and it was mentioned a lot, you might still be able to catch mention of it on CNN or other news network.

This is a good day,
SBC

Bwahh!!!!!

BLEYDDYN

Monday, June 21, 2004 4:24 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by ScottishBrownCoat:
History has been made today Browncoats

True, and very awesome! I got all teary eyed just watching the landing (traffic sucked and I missed the launch

). However...

Quote:
...the First privately owned spaceship hit orbit and landed successfully today.

Space Ship One did NOT reach orbit! I haven't heard confirmation of how high it did go, but they are saying it went at least 100k (62 miles) up, which is generally considered to be in 'space' and is above the point at which NASA awards astronaut status. But it came straight back down, rather than circling the Earth, which is pretty much the definition of orbit. It's probably being hammered right now, but check out the web site of the Burt Rutan's company, http://www.scaled.com, for more details later today.

--Bleyddyn

SGTGUMP

Monday, June 21, 2004 4:36 PM

_____________________________________
"Space Ship One did NOT reach orbit!"
_____________________________________

It wasn't supposed to reach orbit! Only break the threshold of space WITHOUT any govenment aid.

Once again Capitalism is paving the way for human exploration and advancement.

With all the bad news out today, I find some hope in knowing that ordinary citizens are taking initiative and reaching for our future as a space faring people.

VOTE LIBERTARIAN

NOOCYTE

Monday, June 21, 2004 4:37 PM

Yes, indeed, a VERY exciting thing has happened today. Burt Rutan's Space Ship One is the first completely privately funded craft ever to cross the imaginary line into space, thus taking a little bit of the space-faring mojo away from governments and aerospace conglomerates. In short, this is a victory for Independents everywhere!

You can find a lot more info at www.spaceflightnow.com (which I've set as my homepage, if that tells you anything about me!). This (Space Ship One) is one to watch, as it's the leading contender for the Ansari X-Prize, which will award a $10 million purse to the first team to launch a craft with three people (or one pilot and the mass equivalent of two passengers) into suborbital space, then turn around and do it again with the same ship in two weeks.

The implications for space tourism are profound, and, in turn, the implications for bringing economies of scale into play on launch services are huge. Once space launches become routine, the costs are thus driven down, and we will really start to see some action, the kind of adventurous, frontier, entrepreneurial spirit which will truly open up space to industry and exploration in ways which government-sponsored Programs have never been able to manage. Private enterprise (no pun intended) will always be leaner and quicker than the military-industrial beheamoth. So, no matter how far the arm of the Alliance reaches, we'll just push out a little further (hmmm...sounds familiar...).

Keep Flyin' (higher and higher)

Department of Redundancy Department

BLEYDDYN

Monday, June 21, 2004 5:09 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by sgtgump:
_____________________________________
"Space Ship One did NOT reach orbit!"
_____________________________________

It wasn't supposed to reach orbit! Only break the threshold of space WITHOUT any govenment aid.

Sorry! Didn't mean to imply that it was supposed to reach orbit. It did exactly what it was supposed to do! Reach the edge of space and come back safely.

Burt Rutan is at least as much of a genius in his field as Joss is in his. And Mike Melville (the pilot for todays launch) has just earned the title of BDH, at least in my book.

--Bleyddyn

SCOTTISHBROWNCOAT

Monday, June 21, 2004 5:16 PM

Ok, I misheard on tv, so it reached orbit but did not break orbit? Is that correct. Well that's somethin' in my opinion.

First steps Guys....first steps.....

Bwahh!!!!!

NOOCYTE

Monday, June 21, 2004 5:23 PM

Actually, SS1 flew a suborbital trajectory. If you throw a rock straight up, it executes a parabolic trajectory; it goes straight up, reaches a peak, then falls straight down. This is essentially what SS1 did. It would have needed about 8 times the energy to reach orbit (that is, to gather enough speed to balance the force of gravity, and fall around the earth without hitting it -- a rough definition of orbit). Nonoetheless, this is a milestone, in that it reached what is commonly defined as the edge of space, or around 100 klicks up. Burth Rutan is shooting for orbit sometime down the road, but SS1's is a more modest (but still historic) goal...for now.

Keep flyin'!

Department of Redundancy Department

MANTICHORUS

Tuesday, June 22, 2004 8:59 AM

Yep, definately a cause for celebration...
Something else that's going to be interesting is the proposed, near-future reform of NASA. What this'll mean is currently unknown, but someone (read as: one of the top brass) has made a comment about a manned flight to Mars by 2020.
But for us normal folk, the privately owned launch is more promising. While NASA, the ESA, and the other space agencies pave the way into the black, people like Burth Rutan (unusual name) will be making space travel a reality for the everyday person... with stacks of cash. I can't help but remember the amount it cost to fly Concorde(RIP), and I doubt it'll be cheaper to fly in a sub-orbital (or orbital) flyer.

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DRAKON

Tuesday, June 22, 2004 11:30 AM

How expensive were those first China Clipper flights that Pan Am ran after Lindbergh's solo flight?

Its a step, a bit and important step, but just a step. For someone who was born between Yuri's and Alan's first flights, this is a step that I have been waiting for, for quite a while.

Burt and Paul are talking 20 to 100 grand per trip. Not within the reach of a lot of us, but if they ever put a hotel up in orbit, like at least one Japanese firm wants to do, that price should come down a fair bit.

The thing that really cheeses me off is that Mike Melvill, the pilot and humanity's news ASTRONAUT is 63 years old. I always wanted to be an astronaut, it was the thing when I was a kid. But astronauts don't wear glasses, and when I got my first pair in the fifth grade, I thought it might a lost dream.

Maybe not. I am 20 years younger than Mike, perhaps this is in my reach. Or will be before check out time.

Thanks Burt, Paul and Mike for giving this old man the sky back.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

RAWDEAL

Tuesday, June 22, 2004 11:42 AM

With a fraction of a cost of NASA's any space project manned or not.

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