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First Private Manned Orbital Flight Announced
Miroslav Ambrus-Kis wrote in to tell us that Inter-orbital Systems has announced that Nebojsa Stanojevic and Miroslav Ambrus-Kis will be the astronauts aboard the first completely private orbital flight. This is part of their bid for the Google Lunar X-Prize.
No, according to the TFA, they are "Tweeting Experienced Explorers".
Whatever the Hell that happens to be.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Okay, so personally I think this particular company doesn't seem to have much chance of succeeding. They don't seem to have the funding or the infrastructure. But what's important is this: for the first time ever we're seeing private companies trying to develop launch capabilities. And not just one or two, and not just so they can resell to governments (like SpaceX), but a bunch of them, with many different business models. You throw enough paint at the wall, some of it might stick. And, eventually, I think it is possible to dramatically reduce launch costs this way--which makes things like solar power satellites and space tourism practical.
In 50 years, the space industry could be transformed by this sort of thing into an actual, profit-making enterprise. And it's only once there is profit to be had that the ideal of true multi-planetary life can become a reality.
"He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere. " -- John Calvin, commenting on Genesis 1
They haven't launched yet (and are at least two years from launch according to their plans), so there's no way to guarantee their claims.
If you look at their news page there is a 2004 announcement that they'd be launching a satellite in 2006, but there is no news of an actual launch.
In fact I don't even see news of a flight test of any sort, let alone a full orbital launch.
TBH the website also looks like a pretty fly-by-night operation. You would think that a company with enough money to launch a manned space mission would be able to hire a web designer.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
The Google Lunar X Prize has nothing to do with manned space travel. It's about launching a robot that can deliver HD images from the moon.
Maybe their plan is to go up there and launch the robot from orbit - just seems like an awful waste of energy.
Genesis 1:32 And God typed
Hating NASA is like a religion these days. Anything NASA does is bad. No matter. Kinda makes you look a fool, though, when you start letting it warp your logic.
Patriotism is a virtue of the vicious
NASA will be asking the Church of Scientology for a lift before these jokers.
The fact is, the private sector does not have a real role in the ISS; Russia can handle the people and Europe the cargo for less money, and can do it right now, than US private enterprise. The only reason SpaceX got a sniff of a contract (when their unproven Dragon capsule being less capable and less value for money than ATV) is because the US government is pushing NASA to go for US private companies even when they aren't the best at their job; thus negating the supposed advantage of private enterprise.
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
I've built things in my garage, and flown them multiple times and with more power, than the only thing these people have ever had leave the pad vertically. Sure, they've been static testing all sorts of motors. More's the pity -- I don't have to.
These upstart startups are trying to cash in on investment money (though I do credit IOS with selling tubesat and ad space) and behaving at the functional amateur level as though they're professionals. The startups that don't rely on investors (Armadillo, Scaled until the second half of SS1, etc.) accomplish things the others don't. Still, they're spending a lot on R&D that they don't need to.
My money, and anyone's who wants in, says an amateur-built vehicle made from commonly available materials and off the shelf parts could put itself into orbit for under 6 figures. That includes all incidentals and consultancies. The motors, a major development issue with these companies, are available from Loki Research. Their 96" x 152mm 80,000 ns P motors were used in last April's flight of the 1/10 scale Saturn V. The reason he didn't use three was that (> 200,000 ns) would put it in the FAA/OST's ball park and therefore not amateur. Neither would this be, but the point here is to hit the goal, not just go flying with my NAR and Tripoli friends. I ran the numbers on a 3P booster with 1P sustainer using their older 60" x 152 mm 50,000 ns motors. Ground launched it'd break the 62.5 mile 'space' altitude, and balloon launched it'd break 100 miles. The new motors, obviously proven, pack 60% more power. A ground launched 2.5 stage (the 3 x 1 plus 'dart' payload/nose) should do the job.
Somebody's going to do it, before or after one of these startups. It'll be after if nobody tries before. And if it takes money, rather than investors in a commercial endeavor, sell commercials. Rocketman's GoFast, the first amateur rocket to break the space altitude was named for an 'investor' simply for the advertising. And while Dunkin' Donuts isn't likely to jump in (hey, they didn't for Astronaut Farmer, so why now?) there's some who might.
And once a vehicle gets up there, the next step is human flight. A TV commercial costs between $500,000 and $1M to produce and run the first time. For the bottom end of that, using nothing exotic, and if not off the shelf then built from off the shelf components, a truly amateur enterprise could put a person over 62.5 miles. What are the odds that a company used to paying out that kind of money would be willing to have their name on this project, particularly if at apogee that company's catch phrase got broadcast by the amateur astronaut, for instance: "Can you hear me now? Good."
The major difference is on return on investment. The commercial startups need to return their investors' money, plus. An amatuer project only needs to do what it sets out to do. An ad based amateur project only needs to do what an amateur project does, plus acknowledge the source of the funds, and not return anything to anyone beyond noteriety for the accomplishment. If it weren't for the scale of the designs and the lack of available components, Robert Truax would have done this years ago.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
I thought someone might say this :)
I needed to have prefaced that with "NEW private space companies" :)
While I'm not going to address you argument about the private space endeavors - they were and are a bit grandiose in their claims - but the industries you chose as examples of private enterprise are probably four of the most regulated industries in the US economy. Saying that the results of these industries is representative of a free market is laughable.
FWIW, I work in transportation, and it is becoming less regulated over time - and it is more stable than any of the other three.
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