Slashdot Mirror
SpaceshipOne's Control Problem Fixed
Baldrson writes "Wired News reports that Rutan's team says they have gotten to the bottom of the June 21 flight anomalies that affected the first SpaceShipOne sub-orbital flight: 1) A control surface actuator had run against a stop limiting its movement, and 2) Wind shear caused the 90-degree roll shortly after rocket ignition. Rutan also said with the problems now identified, the next time SpaceShipOne flies, it will be to win the prize."
When you're designing a space ship thats primary goal is to get it only to the edges of space, wind shear is one of your top priorities.
Between the private space-flight, a entire space station (built internationally no less), and the possibility of a space elevator, humankind really is heading for the stars!
Even when one ignores the potential billions of dollars in the suborbital tourism market, this also opens the door for intercontinental spaceflights. Even if they don't go into orbit, it still lets people get around the globe quite fast ("one hour from New York to Tokyo") without having to worry about things like sonic booms along their path. Such intercontinental spaceflights are a nice transition to orbital flights.
Even if that's not enough to impress you, it certainly fills me with amazement.
"If you just want to get up there to launch a satellite" which has been done to death if you ask me.... I mean how many countries and companies already do this regularly, OH WAIT!
The prize is for Manned Flight.
Speaking of which, isn't "Space Flight" an oxymoron? Flight implies flying, movement through a medium using lift mechanisms. I was under the impression that generating lift required a medium a little more dense than the vacuum of space. Anyways... I don't see your Sub-Orbital Rocket Plane or Missile on the X-Prize list of contenders.. so that makes you:
a hater, don't hate.
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
Mediocre Troll. Rather than trying to judge their efforts by your own (inaccurate) personal definition of a spaceship, how about you try seeing it for what it is?. I am sure there are folk here who wouldn't consider it a spaceship unless it had Federation markings... "Its an aircraft with a rocket motor attached" - You mean like the space shuttle? "Real spaceships can't use wings to slow themselves down and manuouveaure(sic) because there is no air to do it in!" - Wow, the things you learn... You don't think it's too much of a stretch to add attitude jets to SpaceshipOne? "...whole enterprise to me smacks more of someones ego than anything practical" - So you really, really cannot comprehend this as a stepping stone to greater things?. You actually think the only acceptible first demo would have been a fully-staffed ship doing a few orbits then a nice firey re-entry? 100km is the acknowledged and regulated boundary of space, ok?. If you accept that "ship" is in any case a funny thing to call a flying machine, well I am sure you will have no trouble seeing that it is a spaceship. To be honest, no-one will care if you call it a space-ship, -craft, -plane or whatever, but it has travelled into space. Live with it. You never even heard of the X-prize until last week, did you?.
Redundancy also has a cost - added cost, added weight, added complexity, added development time.
The X-prize competitors probably will have SIGNIFICANTLY less redundancy than any NASA craft would ever have (triple redundancy is normal in spaceflight), but they'll also be cheaper, lighter, and faster-to-completion. The associated risks are ones that government-run institutions just wouldn't take.
So, by putting the competition to the public instead of trying to achieve the same thing through NASA/etc. they're able to test riskier technologies quicker and cheaper - resulting in more significant technological advancement.
The risks are great... but they're being taken by individuals that have weighed them and accept them, not a government that's accountable to it's populace.
My meaningless 0.02.
MadCow.
I used to have a sig, but I set it free and it never came back.
Space tourism itself will have little benefit to society, other than to make a few people happy.
On the contrary, space tourism is an excellent way to transfer money out of the hands of those rich enough to afford it and pump it into the economy. It's like a voluntary tax! If this industry takes off it could create many new jobs, technical jobs like we slashdotters like, here on our shores. How exactly is this a problem?
Besides, we (virtually) don't get a say in it, anyway. Frankly, people have the right to spend their money on what they want to. If they want to blow $20 mil on a few moments in space, that's their prerogative. If an insanely rich person wants to fund expeditions into space with new equipment in addition to what NASA is already doing, it's his money, and what could be wrong with that? If you saved for something you really wanted that was expensive, how would you like it if suddenly the world was trying to tell you what you were spending was a waste?
I'd rather see that money go to NASA than many of the things it does go to.
I'm sure both NASA and the SpaceShipOne project would happily accept any private donations you have to offer, if you believe in it that much.
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.