posted 01-02-2006 08:34 AM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by jamato99:
Pretty interesting, facinating stuff. I wonder what NASA thinks about Rutan's accomplishments and his big plans for the future. Anyone have $200,000 I can borrow???
Jamie

---

Not speaking for NASA, but judging by NASA Administrator Mike Griffin's public actions, NASA is solidly behind commercial tourist flights. Griffin has indicated that NASA would like to buy tickets to orbit from commercial providers who can transport astronauts to the International Space Station, for example, and let NASA focus on missions to the Moon and beyond. Under his direction, NASA has established an office at Johnson Space Center specifically to foster and support commercially-provided cargo and crew flights.

NASA astronauts attended some of the X-Prize launches as observers, including Scott Horowitz, who is now NASA's Associate Administrator for Exploration, and one of the originators of the concept for using the Shuttle Solid Rocket Boster as the first stage for NASA's next generation space capsule.

And, Rutan is a member of the Transformational Space team that NASA has funded to study a simpler way of launching crews to the ISS.

My own opinion is that Rutan did a masterful job of using existing technology in a novel and important way. But remember that "SpaceShipOne" was only a first step. SS1's Mach 3 straight up is only 1/8th the velocity needed for orbit, or judged in terms of kinetic energy (proportional to the square of velocity) only 1/64th the energy required. That leaves "only" 98% of the way to go, which will require substantially more effort in thermal protection, life support, guidance/control, and everything else that was found in even the rudimentary Mercury capsules of the 1960s. Even the X-15 of the late 1950s outperformed SS1 by exploring the Mach 5 velocity regime in low-altitude flight, which Rutan avoided by aiming SS1 nearly vertically as soon as possible, because it would not survive the air resistance of Mach 3 at a lower altitude.

I hope Rutan and his colleagues are successful: the only way I will ever get to orbit is if I can someday buy a ticket--right after I win a lottery!

posted 01-02-2006 03:06 PM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by MCroft04:
I read in Spaceflight magazine that "Richard Branson says that Virgin Galactic has received $10 Million in deposits from 34,000 potential astronauts, who are booked to fly on the SpaceShipOne rocket plane, at a cost of $200,000 for a 15 minute sub-orbital flight". Lets see, that depostit averages just under $300 per person; I wonder how many of those folks are also counting on winning the lottery to get the remainder of the fare.

---

posted 01-03-2006 06:39 PM               

Compared to only 400+ people in 50 years, I think people would be willing to wait.