Space Tourism Isn't Worth Dying For

rudy_wayne writes with this opinion piece at Wired published in the wake of the crash of SpaceShipTwo, which calls the project nothing more than a "millionaire boondoggle thrill ride." A selection: SpaceShipTwo is not a Federation starship. It's not a vehicle for the exploration of frontiers. Virgin Galactic is building the world's most expensive roller coaster, the aerospace version of Beluga caviar. It's a thing for rich people to do. Testing new aircraft takes a level of courage and ability beyond most humans. Those engineers and pilots are at the peak of human achievement. What they're doing is amazing. Why Virgin is doing it is not. When various corporate representatives eulogize those two pilots as pioneers who were helping to cross the Final Frontier, that should make you angry. That pilot died not for space but for a luxury service provider. His death doesn't get us closer to Mars; it just keeps rich people further away from weightlessness and a beautiful view.

Comments

Liquid fuels

[MichaelSmith]

I looks like the hybrid solid/liquid engine isn't going to push SS2 to 100km altitude. The original compound ran rough and it doesn't have a high enough specific impulse. The new compound explodes. Dick Rutan demonstrated a Long-EZ equipped with a liquid fueled engine in 2001. I think it is time to go back to XCOR and ask about a bigger engine.

Re: Well

[Goaway]

The SpaceShipTwo is not a space plane. It can not get you into space and stay there. It can only go up, and then fall down immediately. Developing the SpaceShipTwo is not going to get you an actual space plane, because such a plane would have to be designed very, very differently from the SpaceShipTwo.

Re:Not worth it ?

[khallow]

The obvious, devastating rebuttal is that I could have had that money instead. Why don't the rich people think of me?