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U.S. Okays Virgin Galactic Plans
Aron writes "Space.com reports that the U.S. Department of State's Directorate of Defense Trade Controls has approved collaboration of technical details between Scaled Composites of Mojave, California and Virgin Galactic of the United Kingdom to build passenger-carrying suborbital spaceliners. The next suborbital ship will be a nine person vessel." From the article: "Details about the new company were unveiled at the Experimental Aircraft Association's (EAA) AirVenture air show held July 25-31 in Oshkosh, Wisconsin.
The Spaceship Company will build a fleet of commercial suborbital spaceships and launch aircraft. Scaled Composites is to be under contract for research and development testing, as well as certification of a 9-person SpaceShipTwo (SS2) design, and a White Knight Two (WK2) mothership to be called Eve."
It will be lauched by the mothersip, White Knight II.
Si vis pacem, para bellum
The only thing more annoying than a Libertarian is an (un|mis)informed Libertarian
From TFA: ... ?We are already in discussion with a number of states in the United States,? Whitehorn said
The location to produce the fleet of rocket planes is very likely to be Mojave, California. ?That?s where we expect to be in production,? Whitehorn said, although the takeoff site of Virgin Galactic?s public space trips is a different matter.
When they say "a number of states", I think the number is close to 1. Texas has laws on the books establishing "Spaceport Development Corporations" with the authority to levy taxes, and the three locations that have established these SDCs all have big advantages over anyplace else in the US:
* One is in the middle of nowhere, for early testing (which might include Things Blowing Up).
* One is an hour away from Houston, for when suborbital and orbital commercial flights become routine.
* One is not-too-far away and offers launching above water, for flights after "experimental" but before "routine".
For further reference, this Houston Chronicle article name-drops about everyone remotely involved in a private space project, from Amazon's Jeff Bezos to Carmack to Armadillo/Id Guy John Carmack.
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
Since Virgin Galactic isn't a US company, the Department of Defense has a say in whether Scaled Composites can send them certain technological information, under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) (the same rules that make those crypto t-shirts "munitions").
It's not surprising that they passed, since VG is a British company, and the Brits are the good guys. Presumably some guarantees have been made that this isn't going to turn into plans for cruise missiles for Iranians.
So they haven't been given the go-ahead to fly, just to begin collaboration. They still have to come up with the actual spacecraft, and then there's a whole new set of approvals before they can fly the things.
Specifically, from Article 4 of Virgin's Deposit Terms and Conditions:
Yep, they've got six months to give the money back, but they do guarantee they will.
Think of it, we have one company now that will soon be selling rides on a sub-orbital craft. How long will it be before a competitor steps up and offers LEO rides?
A long, long while. The technology used on SS1 is utterly incapable of getting anything to orbit. The amount of energy to achieve orbit is about ten times what it took for the parabolic flight SS1 managed. The fuel used simply cannot provide enough thrust to get itself to orbit, much less itself plus a spaceship plus a payload.
There are also huge differences in the mechanical stresses involved in reentering the atmosphere at suborbital speeds and at orbital speeds. SS1 hitting the atmosphere at orbital speeds, would be confetti in seconds.
They've got a long way to go.
narrowing the gap to orbit
*Not even close*. SS2 is going to 135-140km straight vertical. About 90% of the energy of a craft in orbit is horizontal, and the other 10% verticle; the minimum LEO orbit is around 250km. You do the math.
Listing price per pound on something that goes nowhere useful and doesn't even come close to scaling to somewhere useful is pretty pointless.
Kneel Before Christ!
the closer to the equator you are, the less energy you need to expend to get into space as you can use the earth's rotational velocity to propel you up there. So you have less fuel or more cargo. Some commercial launches take this to its extreme and launch off converted oil platforms in the ocean, which are towed to the equator by tugboats.
Of course, there are other considerations. Nasa uses cape canaveral because not only is it very far south, its surrounded by water on 3 sides meaning launch mishaps are less likely to damage anything. And the water location means barges can deliver components too big for truck or rail to deliver, like booster engines and fuel tanks.
The weather is also a factor. Mojave is popular because the weather there is pretty boring and its sparse land.
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Well, it's got an airfield with a long enough runway to land most large jets (I've seen 747's, C5's, and the big Russian cargo jets there(*)). Even the Concord was able to land/take off there. The airport isn't that busy so it can basically be dedicated to just the airshow the entire week.
:)
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Besides, given that it's a fly-in, I suspect that part of the appeal to the pilots is that they get to fly someplace to go to it
A complete history can be found here
(*) I grew up in Ripon, WI under the approach route. Having a C5 suddenly go over your house in a location where the largest plane normally going over is a crop duster is quite an experience....
Go Badgers! -- #include "std/disclaimer.h"
That link does not appear to be advertisement related in any way. Google randomly rotates certain block of IP addresses to have modified links on their search results so Google can track outgoing hits. It's like that the submitter just Googled for Virgin Galactic URL and didn't bother to notice that he had a modified link.
The Spaceship Company will build a fleet of commercial suborbital spaceships and launch aircraft. Scaled Composites is to be under contract for research and development testing, as well as certification of a 9-person SpaceShipTwo (SS2) design, and a White Knight Two (WK2) mothership to be called Eve.
It looks like it's going to be a 9-person version of the same essential design as SpaceShipOne, launching from a mothership at altitude then using a rocket booster to above 360k feet. I would assume that they will use every trick they've learned so far with the previous craft in the new design.
Then maybe this would be more your style. Its the design for the CXV, a proposed crew transfer vehicle to to get 4 people to and from LEO and the ISS, also being worked on by Scaled Composites along with Transformational Space. Currently its under a small NASA contract, that is a lesser known little brother to the CEV, though you can tell this is intended to be the orbital successor to SpaceShipOne and they want to use it for private space travel. I'm hoping they can scrape together the funds to make it a reality.
They've drop tested a 23% scale model launch stack at Mojave, and dropped tested the capsule parachute system off Crescent City, CA.
The Airforce is funding the Falcon two stage launch vehicle under its QuickReach program. Its fuled by LOX and Propane. Its a VAPAK pressure fed system with no expensive turbopumps. You heat the fuel and build up pressure in the tank instead of using pumps. This isn't viable for launch for sea level but works great for air launches.
So of course this craft is also air launched like SpaceShipOne for a lot of reasons listed on the web site. A big challenge is they need either a very large new version of White Knight or a used 747 with major changes to the landing gear to accomadate slinging the spacecraft underneath it.
The capsule is based on scaled up version of the well proven Discover/Corona capsules used 400+ times to return film from spy satellites. The capsule is reusable with minor refurbishment between launches. It uses 2 layers of SIRCA thermal tiles developed at NASA Ames. It ocean lands with parachutes like Apollo, partially since this make it possible to safely land on 2/3rds of the Earth's surface in an emergency.
@de_machina
I'd give very, very serious thoughts to trading both nuts to work in his shop.
c ontent=http%3A//www.spacex.com/careers.php
In case you were serious, both Scaled and Virgin Galactic are hiring, as are Blue Origin, Bigelow Aerospace, and SpaceX:
http://www.scaled.com/careers/
http://www.virgingalactic.com/jobs.asp
http://www.blueorigin.com/jobs.htm
http://www.spacex.com/index.html?section=careers&
http://www.bigelowaerospace.com/employment.html
They did something amazing and my hat is off to them, however, it is silly to compare that to Alan Shepard. Technological difference besides Shepard went to 116 statute miles (according to Nasa) above the earth and Scaled Composites made just under 64 statute miles (according to Scaled's press release). Twice as high is quite a difference.
-------------------------------END--COMMUNICATION
It isn't altitude that costs the massive amount of energy needed to achieve orbit. It's speed. SS1 seems to have managed about Mach 3. That's roughly 3,000 mph. Orbit is six times that. Plus 60 miles vs at least 300 for any kind of stable orbit. It's literally ten times the energy to achieve orbit, over what SS1 did.
SS1 was a real milestone, certainly. It's significant progress in the privatization of space.
But we won't be seeing private orbital space launches for some time. Very little of the technology used in SS1 will be of any value at all for an orbital system. It was a valuable learning experience, and they developed a process that will serve them well. But the technology is hopeless.