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Photos Of Rutan's X-Prize Entry

Posted by timothy on from the private-enterprise dept.

burdicda writes "I think you might be interest in what Burt Rutan has been up to, out there in the Mojave Desert. Take a look at these pictures."

4 of 125 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Last year called... by RedWizzard · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Who, exactly is wondering what Burt Rutan is up to? I mean, I realize that not everybody cares about spaceflight, but I promise that anybody who knows who Burt Rutan IS could hardly have missed the 2010 recent news stories about what he is up to. I guess unless they are a slashdot editor...
    What's worse is that the pictures are all just ripped off the Scaled Composites site's photo gallery. What is the point of this article exactly? Just to reward some guy for a bit of copyright infringement?
  2. No Good Pilot by Maxwell'sSilverLART · · Score: 3, Interesting

    ...would dare take off without his trusty West Bend timer! (Picture at http://sd-mirror.dumitru.com/scaled/sso042a.sized. jpg)

    West Bend timers...IN SPACE!

    (Yes, I know that's actually White Knight's cockpit. Smile and nod.)

    --
    Moderate drunk! It's more fun that way!
  3. Spaceflight video, with floating M&Ms! by FleaPlus · · Score: 4, Interesting

    As many of you know, the pilot of SpaceShipOne released a bunch of M&M's near the top of his historic spaceflight. Scaled just recently released video of the launch, which includes chase plane and in-cockpit views. The floating M&M's are near the end. It's incredibly cool to watch -- one of the M&M's flies right by the camera! This video doesn't have sound, as I believe the "full" version is licensed for an upcoming Discovery Channel special.

    I wonder if Mars, Inc. is going to try to license that video for a commercial.

  4. Re:NASA by Bob_Robertson · · Score: 2, Interesting

    This is where not paying for government in the first place really shines. Without Big Mommy taking 50% of what you make, and 50% of what other people make by selling you stuff, and so on, without even mentioning the cost of complying with regulations with every step you take, what would you do with all that extra money?

    Would you invest it in some crackpot rocketship? There are a whole bunch of people who would.

    And yes, NASA has directly restricted the development of private space vehicles, by using tax money to undercut any possible competition. When they loosened their regulations just a little bit some few years ago, some crackpot rocket jockey proposed and built the "Pegasus" launch vehicle which puts small satellites into orbit at a tiny fraction of the cost NASA wanted to charge even with its massive taxpayer subsidy.

    Why do you think only Big Corporations can build launch vehicles? Rutan isn't a big company. The Pegasus vehicle is exceptionally cheap to build, but requires a primary launch platform (F-15 style) that by law private people in the US may not own or operate. There's that regulatory burden again.

    Bob-

    --
    The Ludwig von Mises Institute. The reasoning individuals economics