Virgin Galactic to Build Space Port in New Mexico

aapold writes "Virgin Galactic today announced plans to build a $225 million space port in southern New Mexico. Richard Branson will meet with governor Bill Richardson Wednesday to unveil the plans. Virgin Galactic is the company leveraging Spaceship One which, as reported by Slashdot, claimed the Ansari X prize for commercial space flight."

Comments

Exciting times

[Orgazmus]

This is really exciting times. A private spaceport is emerging, and the "real" exploration of space can begin.
I cant wait until my first moon-vacation ;D

Re:Exciting times

[Pxtl]

Yes, but this isn't like water pollution. We're throwing several orders of magnitude less crap into several orders of magnitude more volume. This is one of those cases where you don't have to deal in absolutes like "we will eventually fill it, we said the same about pollution" - at our current rate, filling it is the least of our worries.

Basically, by the time that we have enough industry that creating space pollution is a serious problem, we should have the technology to start thinking about junk removal. Right now, we have neither the ability to cause significant pollution, nor the capability to avoid it, so it's doubly moot.

Good for Business?

[TwoTailedFox]

I'm trying to think of the long-term implications of having a space-port. You have noise pollution, traffic problems, and money that the populace argues would be better spent elsewhere, say, Africa, or Brixton, UK.

The commercial opportunities must far outweigh those potential problems.

Re:Good for Business?

[z0idberg]

Lots of job opportunities for the local population. Someone has to work there to keep the place running. Specialists would move to the area to work there as well meaning new housing developments etc so more growth in construction, retail stores in the area etc. Then if it really takes off your state/area could become the space capital of the world which would could easily be worth billions (trillions?). If you have the real estate to spare I would think it would be worth the investment.

Careful there....

[c0dedude]

Remember, the CEOs of tech companies failed to constrain costs in the late 1990s, and we know what happened to them. Be very careful in spending. Consider whether this port is absolutly necesssary.

Chump Change...

[joey_knisch]

Compared to NASA.

They spent $800 million on a new launch center... IN 1962

Space == Money

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

The commercial opportunities must far outweigh those potential problems.

No kidding. Branson's investement is pretty much a no brainer. Estimates of price per ticket are at around $200,000 dollars a seat, times seven passengers is $1.4 million dollars in cash per flight.

Branson's in the airline business already. I'm not sure about the specifics of it, but I seriously doubt that there are any regular commercial flights out there that pull in $1.4 million dollars per trip. Even those that come close would be 747 type aircraft that probably cost as much to run as SpaceShipTwo will anyway. Can we get some figures here?

Now I would have said that Branson's best bet was to set up shop in some middle of nowhere location, to dodge regulations. But the fact that he's setting up shop inside the US shows that he's serious about doing things professionally. Nonetheless I expect customers will be expected to sign off in the event of an accident.

As to potential customers. Does anyone seriously suggest that Branson won't be able to find people willing to spend $200,000 on a trip into orbit. There are thousands of people who spend ten times that on a boat. I think he'll manage to fill a plane once a week at least.

Step 1: Wait for private group to develop initial technology.
Step 2: Buy group and its technology.
Step 3: Scale up development
Step 4: Charge suckers $200,000 per flight AND satisfy them
Step 3: PROFIT!!

Philippe Starck to design

[Cabby]

I see from the The Register that Philippe Starck is going to design the new base. I wonder if they picked him solely due to his War of the Worlds lookalike lemon squeezer?

I'd like to see .....

[Ex-MislTech]

A high altitidue balloon based launch platform .

Imagine a platform at 160,000 feet, that uses a mass driver to toss cargo into low orbit .

High altitude ballons could carry the cargo to the platform 30 miles above the earth .

NASA has already done a small scale version of this :

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/08/02082 7063353.htm

It would be a huge and complex task, but imagine a giant platform with many ballons in case one
fails, and a magnetic mass driver near the center to toss cargo into low orbit .

Power the mass driver would be difficult at that altitude with nearly zero oxygen .

Perhaps fuel cells, solar panels, or other non-combustion method .

I am curious how much a 30 mile headstart plus mag driver boost would help with fuel
cost to achieve Low Earth Orbit .

For the Anti Mass Driver crowd NASA has considered this before .

http://www.freeluna.com/spasnotes.htm

http://www.ssi.org/body_research.html#mass-drivers

http://members.aol.com/oscarcombs/moondust.htm

Thanks !
Ex-MislTech

Will it have

[Galston]

Will it have a duty free shop and if so what will it sell?

Re:Hardly

[mi]

Doesn't sound too bad until you think about an aerostatically supported platform trying to launch things into predictable orbits while oscillating all over the place from the reaction force of the launches.

Very precise-hitting missiles are known to be launchable from hunks of steel flying miles above the earth. Once launched, in other words, the rocket can correct itself even if the platform oscillated and stumbled because of the launch.

Who would staff a platform at an altitude of 30 miles? How would you get them up and down?

The platform -- with the rocket mounted on it, the stuff needed, and the handful of support personnel (if any) -- can rise slowly from the ground some time before launch by inflating the baloons, and come back down afterwards by gradually deflating or releasing them.

Yes, I am talking about still using rockets, but with the huge headstart provided by the flying platforms and starters they would be able offer much better payload ratios.