Slashdot Mirror

powerbarr writes "This article has an excellent description of the issues of getting into the rocket industry without government funding and focuses on one startup that is doing it. Sea Launch is a subsidiary of American, Russian, Ukrainian, and Norwegian companies that has cheaper, more accurate, and more reliable launch system that is trying to compete with all the government sponsored systems that are more expensive and less reliable."

After the spectacular failure of the last go-round, Kyle writes: "The commercial venture Sea Launch has successfully launched another communications satellite into geosynchronous orbit, restoring confidence in the floating launch system after a launch failure earlier this year. The video Webcast was entertaining, complete with hints that they threw a pretty good post-launch party out there in international waters." Reader marat points to CNN coverage of the launch. Isn't it neat how the space game is heating up?

koziarz wrote to us about the failure of Boeing's SeaLaunch system yesterday. The rocket was actually a Ukranian-Russian rocket, being launched on the SeaLaunch system. It should be noted as well, however, that SeaLaunch has succesfully completed two launches. But losing a USD100 million satellite system is gonna hurt. Boeing has issued a press release concerning the loss.