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Tuesday 22 June 2004

WHOOOSH! and Space Ship One is away! [brit]

It appears the glory days of early '50s science fiction are back folks, and I for one am pleased as punch.
Looking like a souped up version of War Rocket Ajax, the privately built and piloted Space Ship One today broke a aeronautical milestone that will happily sit alongside the first trans atlantic crossing in terms of importance.
The X Prize is starting to deliver.
For those that don't know, the X Prize is an international competition with a $US 10m pay check for whichever non governmental organisation puts a reusable craft into space with three passengers, and repeats the exercise within a fortnight.
Everyone from amateur pyros to serious corporates have been working on this for years, and today Scaled Composite's awesome looking craft took off from Mojave Airport and got itself to 100.8km (68.2 miles) above the earth's surface and into sub orbital flight before landing 90 minutes later.
This is seriously cool stuff - the fact that the craft itself looks so utterly different from the usual NASA/Russian/ESA affairs is a bonus too; you can almost see the huge bacolite control panel and assorted toggle switches...
Of course, it's cutting edge tech - and I have to say, this one story today restored my faith in our collective need to explore, push the limits, and do the so called 'impossible'.
Bravo.

2 comments:

  1. It never happened! It was a mock up on a sound stage in Arizona. They're fooling you, fool! Leading experts have said time and time again that radiation would cook astronaughts if they go into space!!!!111 Besides, how do they break through the sky? HOW??

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  2. Brit, when's the next flight due out? Will the $10m payout cover the drug expenses of the creators?
    You do realise that China Lake airforce base is just near the Mojave airstrip they took off from, they are going to get blasted out of teh goddam sky... YEEEEEEHAW!Ah right, I see. It wasn't an attempt for the prize, it's just a test.
    abclocal.go.com

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