Mike Melvill Chosen To Fly SpaceShipOne 527
ansimon writes "Mike Melvill is chosen to fly SpaceShipOne to the outer limits of this rock that we call earth. Mike will be the first to earn his astronaut wings with a privately-developed aeroplane/rocket. A new era of space exploration is about to begin! Godspeed and come back safe, so the rest of us can go too..."
For the sake of argument . . . (Score:5, Interesting)
On the other hand, not much left to top this if it does go flawlessly.
Going there (Score:2, Interesting)
First since Columbia (Score:5, Interesting)
Wonderful! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:To save everyone some time tomorrow ... (Score:3, Interesting)
Being a die-hard conservative, I for one welcome our new corporate astronauts and look forward to it creating some new ideas at NASA as well. Obviously, this depends on your link still being funny tomorrow at lunch, rather than prophetic.
Disaster? Unlikely. (Score:5, Interesting)
Good luck and Godspeed to the SpaceShipOne team.
Re:First since Columbia (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:I guess the question here is (Score:3, Interesting)
No it isn't. The answer is Burt Rutan and Scaled Composites using Paul Allen's $20M. Nothing from the government, nothing from "the people". The question is, why do people think they deserve to share in the accomplishments of others when they have contributed nothing to that success?
Honor the successful. Emulate them if you can, aspire to it if you can't, and if nothing else let them inspire you. When you, in the individual or collective sense, accomplish something significant, then you deserve credit.
The last great X-Plane (Score:4, Interesting)
To Mike and the rest of the SpaceShipOne crew, best of luck tomorrow.
Work environment (Score:3, Interesting)
Smooth flight guys. As someone said earlier [slashdot.org], don't forget your towel!
If there's any doubt about 'space' (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:First since Columbia (Score:2, Interesting)
Once a private company can launch greater than 100 tons to the Moon and NASA can't do more (like the Saturn V), I'll be ashamed. Until then please realize that $20M is not puting anything useful into space, nor can it without going over 200 miles up. Neat for space tourism, but hardly comparable with even the most trivial accomplishments of NASA.
If they want to have a useful prize, a spaceship should be able to:
1) Go into a stable orbit
2) Allow personel excursions
3) Allow ship to ship dockings
4) Carry 20 or more tons of cargo into space
5) Be able to stay in space for multiple days
Until then, any spaceship made is just a tourist platform. The fact that your post got modded insightful just shows how many moderators will give bonuses to anti-US posts (especially ones that insult our incredibly sucessful space program).
Re:Disaster? Unlikely. (Score:5, Interesting)
I have to disagree here. This vehicle is significantly more complex than the Mercury missions. Radical - yes, in the sense of using a dual-aircraft staging ascent, but you do not get much more simple than a redstone rocket with a purely ballistic capsule for re-entry. SpaceShipOne is closer to the space shuttle than it is to a Mercury capsule, in the sense that it flys like an aircraft with all the appropriate control surfaces - not to mention the feathering wing during re-entry. Radical - yes, simple - no. Bear in mind, that this design is made possible by relatively modern composite materials, so comparing this design to a 1950's iron capsule is a bit unfair.
Let me preface what I am about to say with the following: I think that what Scaled Composites has done is nothing short of amazing. I don't need to wish them the best, as I have been to their plant, and seen and crawled inside their vehicle. They will win the X-prize tomorrow... That said, I believe that SpaceShipOne is more of a bureocratic and idealogical achievement. First off, SC defined the process by which civilian companies are certified for space flight. Second, this event will usher in a newfound pride and enthusiasm for space exploration that has been missing for decades.
Unfortunately, this design is not very, well, useful other than to make Scaled Composites LOTS of money from space tourists. There is not a lot of interest otherwise in sub-orbital (heck, the Soviets skipped it entirely). SpaceShipOne was point designed to win the X-prize; the approach used is not scalable to an orbital version.
All that having been said, I am very excited for the future of space flight... I know what I will be doing tomorrow morning!
and yes, IAARS.
Re:Yes, but (Score:3, Interesting)
Pretty strong test pilot cred (Score:3, Interesting)
When I was a little kid, I wanted to be Chuck Yeager. Now I'm sitting at home reading Slashdot. Sigh.
Would a private moon expedition be possible? (Score:3, Interesting)
Maybe biotech companies would be interested in investing in building their own orbital lab? Or maybe I've just had a bit too much coffee...
Full Power? (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Would a private moon expedition be possible? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:This puts NASA in a very interesting position (Score:1, Interesting)
Also, NASA has been pulled into a lot of science. Missions these days don't get off the ground without major scientific merit. Long gone are the days of the space race, when simple making it to the moon was the goal. I know moon research was conducted, but we did make the trip too collect rocks. We did it to push the limits of our technology (creating newer better technolgies) and to beat the Russians to it.
Why are astronauts wished Godspeed? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:To save everyone some time tomorrow ... (Score:5, Interesting)
Of course, but... (Score:3, Interesting)
Of course, but everything space-related and government-funded that was really needed for this flight was learned over 40 years ago.
North by Northwest? (Score:3, Interesting)
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid
An inquiring mind (mine) wants to know a few things.
After a Northwest Airlines Airbus passenger plane landed at Ellsworth Air Force Base, the passengers were detained for some 3 hours, interrogated, after being ordered to shut their window covers.
So, does anyone know what is so special about Ellsworth that the windows were ordered shut? This does not seem to be the case (ordering shuttered windows) at Portland and some other bases sharing a border with commercial airports.
Could the crew and or passengers have been interrogated as to whether they shot footage or filmed any of the base during descent? Did the military confiscate their cameras, or merely look at each frame and scan every laptop for pictures of the base (or look for quickly-hidden compact flash or other media disks), or did the military fly out with them on the short hop over the hill, ensuring that NO-ONE shot any pix or opened their window covers?
Even more importantly, how can the pilot and first officer of a plane with probably more computing power than a space shuttle land 5 miles off course and onto a MILITARY base, unless they turned off the electronics or doubted the electronics, and landed by VFR, or Visual Flight Rules. And, even MORE telling, does this say the the FAA and the flight controllers were asleep at the controls?
Can such a thing happen again? Will this prompt the military to "paint" commercial aircraft to sternly warn them to get back on course? Why did not the military simultaneously call the plane AND the air traffic control tower and vector the commercial plane away? Doesn't this say that even after 9/11, the military and commercial air traffic control systems, after billions of dollars in equipment and upgrades, STILL/one again let down the public?
SpaceShipOne - Chat available on freenode.net (Score:3, Interesting)
Just wanted to add that we have chat on the irc.freenode.net servers. The room is appropriately named #SpaceShipOne and is now open to the public without password needed.
Since there is apearently no real-time coverage online (unless NASATV desides to cover it), this may be the next closest thing. Share your voice, express your opinion, and just hang out and listen to others.
See you there...
-Pandelirium - registered.freenode.net
Moderator - #SpaceShipOne #maestro #cassini #Pandelirium MaximumPC
http://www.pandelirium.net [pandelirium.net]
Re:Would a private moon expedition be possible? (Score:3, Interesting)
You're right (Score:1, Interesting)
Just try to get some of the large Model Rocket engines and you don't know how true that is.
After all, the terrorist could use Estes rockets to, I don't know... bring down the empire state building or sears tower or the pentagon or something.
But then he has to write his will, too (Score:3, Interesting)
Tricky Dick did pretty well [thesmokinggun.com] with the topic.
Re:Ironic... Slashdot cheering for Microsoftie :) (Score:2, Interesting)
Keep in mind that he left Microsoft before it became the Evile Empire that it is today. Back in those days, many people had reason to cheer M$. Unlike Macs of the time, you could FIX a dos computer rather than just get a new one once it started behaving erratically. Dos mode also allowed computers of the time to run much faster, displaying any window manager consumed a majority of the resources on those old machines. Gates obviously had his mind set on dominating the industry, but at least M$ had some quality products. I seriously doubt that modern day M$ would fund something like this.
Clarification... (Score:4, Interesting)
Look, I think you are missing the point.
This is a private MANNED flight.
So what if the boosters are made by private aerospace firms? All they are launching are toys. Toys that can take zero gravity, zero kelvin, and zero pressure. The big deal about this is about MANNING a capsule into space without a goverment doing anything but giving permits like a building inspector.
You are talking about subcontractors. Look, I understand what you are saying, but to be truthful, your +4 insightful makes no sense here.
MANNED SPACEFLIGHT. MANNED. Non-governmental pilots in space. Big deal. Real big deal considering all the cash that has washed up for NASA.