Armadillo Aerospace Takes Level 1 Lunar Lander Prize

jedibfa writes "Las Cruces International Airport came alive with applause and cheers yesterday afternoon as John Carmack's Armadillo Aerospace took the first place prize for the Level 1 challenge of the Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge, winning $350,000 and bragging rights. Adding to the excitement of the day, shortly before completing their second qualifying flight, Armadillo Aerospace and The Rocket Racing League announced a joint program to develop a sub-orbital tourist vehicle that will fly out of the New Mexico-based Spaceport America and cost less than $100,000 per ticket. On Sunday, the team will have three opportunities to go for the Level 2 challenge that more closely approximates the required performance for a real lunar landing. Good luck, Armadillo Aerospace, both on Sunday and in your new endeavor!" We discussed preparations for the challenge last week. Several other readers have contributed additional coverage, including the Space Fellowship's live blog of the event, the website for Truezer0, another team participating in the challenge, and a VentureBeat article discussing the economic downturn in space exploration, and how the X-prize competitions figure in. Today's Level 2 challenge will be covered live via webcast.

Re:Obama's position on space prizes

[anethema]

Are you really surprised? I'm Canadian so have a somewhat similar view that many of the Europeans do, in that the rest of the world is REALLY hoping Obama wins. After 8 years of bush threatening to put the USA into another depression and stuck in a war it can't win(and should not have started), it is small wonder the Europeans don't want someone in the white house that shares many of Bush's views and a vice president who makes Bush look like a libertarian. Not to mention the prospect of McCain surviving his entire presidency is a little bleak.

So forgive us if we wish your country well by hoping Obama wins (which looks essentially certain at this point but who knows) rather than having another Bush (or worse if McCain died) in office. We hope your economy thrives rather that drops like a rock taking the world economy down with it.

It is all anecdotal, but I'd say roughly 99 percent of the people I meet and speak to about this issue feels the same way.

Re:Video?

[BiggerBoat]

Good lord, we're still at the Las Cruces airport packing up as I type this on my iPhone. I'll be putting together the videos when I get back to Dallas.

Matthew Ross
Armadillo Aerospace