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| SpaceShipOne: Monday Launch Is On |
| 2004-10-04 |
| After a day spent reviewing its spectacular but wild spaceflight Wednesday, aerospace visionary Burt Rutan's team is sticking to its plan to try to capture the Ansari X Prize with a second launch on Monday. X Prize media representative Ian Murphy said Rutan notified competition officials late Thursday afternoon that his American Mojave Aerospace squad will send its SpaceShipOne aloft as planned to take the $10 million jackpot. Rutan picked the date, Oct. 4, because it's the anniversary of the 1957 launch of the Soviet Union's Sputnik I, the flight that marked the dawn of the space age. Under the X Prize rules, the American Mojave team has until 8:34 a.m. and 4 seconds PDT on Oct. 13 to complete its second flight. That's precisely two weeks after SpaceShipOne landed Wednesday. [more] It should occur between 9:00 - 10:30 EST as the winds die down in the Mojave around this time. The Discovery Science Channel has advertised that they will be covering the event from 9:00 EST on. |
| Posted by:.com |
| #42 Frank G. I dated a gal for Ridgecrest. Her Dad worked at China Lake. I hate the freeking Desert. I live on the west side of those mountains all the way across the San Joaquin valley and in the foothills of the Tremblor range (doh, wonder why it's called that.) The Mojave space port has some neat stuff but it's a long drive from here. I stayed up to watch this flight. It was great. |
| Posted by: Sock Puppet of Doom 2004-10-04 7:55:30 PM |
| #41 Without wishing to be too vindictive, I feel a deep gratitude to Burt Rutan for making his prize winning ascent on the anniversary of Sputnik's launch. What finer way to provide a final backhand slap at the old Soviet regime's constant stream of lick-and-a-promise aerospace engineering, than to send aloft an ultimate example of capitalistic commercialized spaceflight? My hat is off to Rutan and the entire crew at Scaled Composites. Their designs and expertise are simply breathtaking. All Americans should feel a glowing pride at this outstanding achievement. Mojave is indeed the new millennium's Kitty Hawk. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2004-10-04 5:59:55 PM |
| #40 Glash Elmeash is Anonymous in Palestinian. |
| Posted by: Mrs. Davis 2004-10-04 4:15:43 PM |
| #39 Classics? OT: I got someone elses cookie when I went to post. Name defaulted to "Glash Elmeash1399"? |
| Posted by: darkCircle 2004-10-04 4:14:15 PM |
| #38 Apparently, today is also the anniversary of Sputnik |
| Posted by: spiffo 2004-10-04 2:15:19 PM |
| #37 Thx, Frank |
| Posted by: lex 2004-10-04 1:14:24 PM |
| #36 $200K per Branson's press release |
| Posted by: Frank G 2004-10-04 1:11:10 PM |
| #35 Any estimates of how much a ticket will cost when commercial flights become viable (I think Branson estimated 2007)? |
| Posted by: lex 2004-10-04 1:05:28 PM |
| #34 Bert Rutan? What do you expect? So, when's the NEXT launch? |
| Posted by: BigEd 2004-10-04 12:56:21 PM |
| #33 .com---the moonbat freaks will beat their gums and Rutan and friends will be heading for the stars. Whatta flight! Hey, folks, thanks for the great running commentary on the launch and flight. Off to work. |
| Posted by: Alaska Paul 2004-10-04 11:32:12 AM |
| #32 AC - The "Board" of the Global Loonies is classic - a collection of GAIA Moonbat Phreaks. Total bullshit. Left to them, nothing would happen, we'd all be headed back to the trees. Dunno if we'd get to keep our digital watches, or not (h/t Douglas Adams), heh. |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 11:19:02 AM |
| #31 Think Rutan's muttonchops will come back into vogue, now? Lol! Waaay cool. |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 11:14:42 AM |
| #30 On final approach... Touchdown at 11:13 EST! PERFECT! |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 11:11:54 AM |
| #29 AC - Lol! Looks like he wants to carve a niche for himself - mebbe as the Space Ethicist, lol! Wotta wannabee moron, heh. |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 11:09:33 AM |
| #28 Private Enterprise Heroes 1 Socialist Luddite Huns 0 |
| Posted by: Atomic Conspiracy 2004-10-04 11:08:29 AM |
| #27 X-Prize Prez announced the X-Prize "Cup" - all participants gathering to demonstrate their technologies - which are varied, to say the least. I assume details on their site... as well as video of this flight... |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 11:07:45 AM |
| #26 The space-loathing luddites at the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space (aka GnawAn'Pis) will be in sackcloth and ashes over this one. Back in June, their sanctimonious arch-druid, Bruce Gagnon, penned this denunciation of Spaceship One, the X-Prize, and privately financed spaceflight in general. GnawAn'Pis, incidentally, also opposes ALL military applications of spaceflight, including communication and reconnaisance. According to them, we should just play nice and trust Kim Jong Il and Vlad Putin among others to keep their word on arms-control agreements. |
| Posted by: Atomic Conspiracy 2004-10-04 11:04:14 AM |
| #25 84 second engine burn to go from 48,000 to 368,000 - that is one hell of a kick in the ass! |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 11:00:56 AM |
| #24 spiffo - confirmed that this exceeds X-15 altitude record. |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 10:59:57 AM |
| #23 yup, if they really hit 368k, they set a new altitude record (shattered it, in fact). The old one was 357k feet set by the X-15 in 1963. |
| Posted by: spiffo 2004-10-04 10:59:46 AM |
| #22 Pulling 5 G's on re-entry now... Down to 3 G's... Looks perfect thus far... |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 10:54:52 AM |
| #21 Descending - down to 180,000 now... |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 10:52:54 AM |
| #20 that would surpass the X-15 record, wouldn't it? |
| Posted by: spiffo 2004-10-04 10:52:42 AM |
| #19 368,000! |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 10:51:31 AM |
| #18 Apogee 362,000, I think they said! |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 10:51:13 AM |
| #17 200,000 ft enroute to 328K Burnout... on momentum, now... 250,000 - black sky from onboard camera... 350,000 - DONE IT! |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 10:50:46 AM |
| #16 Good burn, no roll! |
| Posted by: Steve 2004-10-04 10:49:19 AM |
| #15 Separation at 10:49 EST (RB clock is off about 2 min, heh)... Altitude: 48,000 Rocket ignition is good... Looks stable... AWESOME!!! |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 10:48:27 AM |
| #14 Separation and ignition! |
| Posted by: Steve 2004-10-04 10:48:00 AM |
| #13 AC - I am soooo jealous. I was wildly fascinated, but no one in my tiny world was very interested - even at school. Current altitude 43,800 enroute to 48,000. Thin air slowing rate of climb - now excrutiatingly slow. |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 10:32:55 AM |
| #12 Speaking of my late father, we lived in a very different part of the world on October 4, 1957: the Isle of Wight, near the Highdown Research Station where dad worked on British rocket motors. The place went crazy at the news of the successful Sputnik launch. There was jubilation that the notion of spaceflight had been vindicated*, along with consternation that the accursed Bolsheviks had done it first. I was 8 years old at the time and clearly remember my dad using a model V-2 rocket, a globe, and a ball on a string to illustrate how Sputnik worked. *Just a year earlier, the British Astronomer Royal (appropriately named Woolley) had declared that spaceflight was "utter bilge." |
| Posted by: Atomic Conspiracy 2004-10-04 10:26:53 AM |
| #11 SPOD, I lived in North Edwards (right up Highway 58) in the 80s and my dad lived in Palmdale and Lancaster from the mid-70s until his death in 1994. |
| Posted by: Atomic Conspiracy 2004-10-04 10:14:12 AM |
| #10 Now they call the facility there the Mojave Spaceport... Whoa! I guess Burtz Boyz earned it, heh. |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 10:12:28 AM |
| #9 Over halfway to release... |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 10:07:08 AM |
| #8 Kern huh, SPOD? Ridgecrest? China Lake? Trona?Randsburg? LOL |
| Posted by: Frank G 2004-10-04 10:06:30 AM |
| #7 Phreakin' beautiful craft! |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 9:48:14 AM |
| #6 Lift off... |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 9:47:34 AM |
| #5 Rolling... |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 9:47:06 AM |
| #4 Out of the hanger and already doing pre-flight checks at the end of the preferred runway. |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 9:41:50 AM |
| #3 The wind dies down in Mojave? Um well i guess figuratively it does. My Brother in Law lived there for 2 years. The wind never stops. It does slack off a bit though. Why do you think they got all those windmills making electricity there? I live in Kern County. That is where Mojave is. Good luck Guys. |
| Posted by: Sock Puppet of Doom 2004-10-04 9:20:30 AM |
| #2 Outstanding! |
| Posted by: nada 2004-10-04 9:17:29 AM |
| #1 Weather report is in - perfect conditions both on the ground and aloft. Barring a problem with the ship(s) - it's a go this morning. Launch time is approx 45 minutes - 10:00 EST. |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-04 9:13:36 AM |