Virgin Galactic Passengers May Just Miss Going into Space 203
DavidGilbert99 (2607235) writes "According to the customer contract those signing up for a $240,000 flight on Virgin Galactic's spaceship the company will bring you 'at least 50 miles' above sea level. The problem is that the internationally accepted boundary for outer space is 62 miles above sea level — known as the Karman Line. Virgin is trying to get around the issue by claiming it is using a definition of space used by NASA — in the 1960s."
Re:Does it really matter? (Score:5, Informative)
The Karman line [wikipedia.org] is only arbitrary in so far as they picked a nice even number in the metric system which is pretty damn close to the point where winged flight isn't possible without being at orbital speed. If it had been originally defined in the US customary units, it still would have been in the area of 62 miles up.