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Mike Melvill Chosen To Fly SpaceShipOne
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..."
. . . even if something does go wrong, there wouldn't be any better way to go out, especially with a flight history such as his.
On the other hand, not much left to top this if it does go flawlessly.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
For one who's done a lot of reading of both science fiction as well as cosmology, the stars seem so far out of reach for my short lifetime.
Getting into space isn't exactly reaching the stars, but it's the first step on the journey. I hope the mission goes smoothly and its success is a sign of things to come.
... or the first person to get a privately funded cremation in outer space... you know, whatever floats his boat.
This is really cool.
I have to admit I'd rather be Captain of a
large ship rather than pilot of a small
tin can though...
Saving up for my first starship, which I suppose
will be available in the next 40 years or so,
around the time I'll be having my first mid-life
crisis (or for me, mid-life crisis'es...)
We need to start NOW if we want to have 40 million
people on the moon by 2371...
MALCOLM SCOTT CARPENTER
...Mike Melvill
ALAN SHEPARD
JOHN GLENN
BUZZ ALDRIN
NEIL ARMSTRONG
SpaceShipOne will not only be making history because they will be breaking the tradition that only governments have the ability to get into space. They will also be breaking the tradition that only people with dramatic-sounding names get to perform important space-exploration milestones.
Fly, SpaceShipOne, fly! Fly for the drably-named of the world! For all the "I'm sorry, what's your name again"s of the world! For everyone named "Morton"! You represent all of us.
So far, I have seen some people posting stuff related to Melville dying. This is poor taste.
I honestly hope that Melville completes this first trip unharmed. Not only for his sake, but for our sake. If he dies, the government will more than likely shut the whole private space exploration business down and set humanity back by an untold amount of years.
Why would anyone wish harm upon someone trying to pave the waqy for the rest of us?
I wonder if he's got the weight allowance to bring a towel, just in case...
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Play Six Pack Man. I
First manned vehicle.
Scaled Composites seems to have done their homework. The craft has a double presure hull, is relatively small, and uses a propellant that is arguably more stable than what we burn in our cars. Any failure is more likely to result in an abort than in a catastrophe. SpaceShipOne has been tested extensively, and the design, although radical, is comparitively simple when viewed alongside early government funded sub-orbital flight.
Good luck and Godspeed to the SpaceShipOne team.
Is that really fair to say? Sure, NASA has had its share of red-tape screwups, and some tragic erros, but don't overlook what they *have* done.
From the various articles about the x-prize and spaceshipone one could be forgiven for wondering whether these guys are really going into 'space', because relative to NASA's exploits they aren't exactly going that high. However, pictures like this and this from earlier test flights give a practical idea of just how high they are going to get... awesome! I wish there was some sort of webcast... anyone know of anything live?
Read Pynchon.
They will not win the X-Prize tommorow and they most likely will not win it in the nearest future.
The X-Prize is for 2 manned launches with the equivalent of 3 persons mass within 2 weeks.
Tommorow's flight is 1 person and less ballast mass and AFAIK, scaled has no plans to launch again in the following 2 weeks.
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
It's appropriate to view this attempt win the X Prize with a full perspective of who Scaled Composites are, and where they came from.
Burt Rutan has been thinking outside the box, from the halcyon days of the Vari-Eze & Long-Eze to the innovative Ares and the 'appear-to-thumb-your-nose-at-physics' Boomerang.
His company; Scaled Composites, have not only survived the drastic slump of the light aircraft market in the 80's and 90' but made innovation their tradition - no small feat.
IMHO, they deserve to succeed with this attempt of Spaceship One.
...after finding out his uniform has a red shirt.
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What would Bill Clinton do?