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Trouble In Branson-Land, As Would-Be Space Tourists Get Antsy Over Delays
schwit1 (797399) writes "Rumors are flying that some of the individuals who gave Virgin Galactic deposits for space tourism flights on SpaceShipTwo are demanding their money back. It appears that the most recent delay, revealed by Branson on David Letterman, is the cause." How much would you pay to go to space, if the ticket was only good starting 10 years from now? How about 20? How about, as Branson claims, if it was early next year?
It seems some are claiming they won't consider themselves astronauts if the flight doesn't go above a certain height. Given that they add nothing to the mission other than weight, I say they won't be astronauts no matter how high the flight goes...they are just...ballast.
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
If you have to ask (for your money back) you can't afford it.
You would think prospective human cargo would appreciate this.
This perpetual motion machine Lisa made is a joke, it just keeps getting faster and faster. - Homer
"Some" is actually "one". Who will demand his money back if they can't make the altitude requirement, not because of delays. Other than that, everything about the summary is accurate.
more to the point, the virgin galactic craft doesn't go anywhere. it has no destination other than downrange. so all branson is selling is a roller coaster ride. and an expensive one at that.
the russians (and soon spacex) at least have a space station as a destination.
when religion is no longer the opiate of the masses, governments will resort to real opiates.
A roller coaster ride to 100 km. They aren't selling a destination here, but rather an experience. So it's not a problem for them.
Don't know about Vostok, and don't want to look up the other Mercury missions, but on the second manned orbital Mercury flight, Mercury-Atlas 7, the astronaut on board manually controlled the reentry due to equipment malfunction in the spacecraft. "At the retrofire event, the pitch horizon scanner malfunctioned once more, forcing Carpenter to manually control his reentry, which caused him to overshoot the planned splashdown point by 250 mi (400 km). ("The malfunction of the pitch horizon scanner circuit [a component of the automatic control system] dictated that the pilot manually control the spacecraft attitudes during this event."[8])" -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S...
First off, you're talking about a group of people that probably have more money than they know what to do with anyway. They're likely impatient and aren't accustomed to having to wait for anything.
What they likely don't realize is that they paid for something that, essentially, didn't exist yet. Would you rather they rush and blow you up? Or wait a bit and have a relatively safe ride? (Yes, I say relatively...it is inherently risky after all) They jumped at the chance to be first so they could rub it in their friends' noses.
Me? I'll never be able to afford it, unfortunately. But if I could, I'd wait until it had gone a few times. Let the bugs get worked out.
Real zero-g (not Vomit Comet or theme park rides) would be pretty damn cool
How is vomit comet not 'real zero-g?' Or is your measure based on length of time?
Because whether you're falling on the ISS or fallling on the Vomit Comet, you're still falling...
"However, for a flight that *does* go to orbit and stays a few turns, and doesn't require a spacesuit"
Its probably a good idea to be wearing a spacesuit in case something goes wrong. Theres a lot of junk in low orbit, and if your small craft hits something and starts leaking it could get very uncomfortable. In a bigger craft you would have more time to get your suit on if there was an accident.
You need training and evaluation to go to the ISS though, if only to make sure you don't go nuts and push all the buttons. What Virgin offers is more like a normal flight, where the damage you can do is fairly minimal and the only training needed is an annoying video.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC