Sir Richard Branson Quietly Shelves Virgin Submarine Plan

An anonymous reader writes with news that Sir Richard Branson's goal of diving to the deepest part of the ocean has been put on indefinite hold. "Sir Richard Branson has quietly shelved his latest adventure: an ambitious plan to pilot a submarine to the deepest points of the world's five oceans. The entrepreneur had a grand scheme to explore both space and sea. But his plan for the first rocket ship charging passengers for trips to the edge of space is in jeopardy after the craft crashed during a test flight, killing a pilot. Now Sir Richard's dream of exploring the lowest points on Earth is also on hold. Virgin Oceanic's DeepFlight Challenger submarine was unveiled in a blaze of publicity in April 2011, with Sir Richard describing its mission as 'the last great challenge for humans.' He had hoped the 18ft-long submarine, designed to 'fly' along the ocean floor, would make its maiden voyage to the bottom of the Pacific's Mariana Trench – at a depth of 36,000ft, the lowest known point on Earth – by the end of 2011, or failing that, by 2012."

Comments

No so easy as throwing money at it, is it?

[TWX]

I guess Mr. Branson is discovering that applied science and engineering is a little harder than telling one's vision to one's lieutenants and instructing them to make it happen.

The Apollo programme was 4% of GDP, by itself. If I understand correctly, to date it has been the most expensive and ambitious applied sciences and engineering project that mankind has ever undertaken. I commend those that want to push the private bounds to recreate Apollo-type objectives, but even with techological improvements and increased knowledge from learning from the past it'll still be VERY expensive and VERY difficult.

Re:No so easy as throwing money at it, is it?

[Viol8]

If he actually threw money at these stunts it might help, but everything he does is on a - relatively - shoestring budget. Branson is really nothing more than a publicity seeker. If something works he gets all the kudos while the people who did the actual work you never hear about. And if it doesn't , well he'll just smile than kilowatt smile and do the whole humble awww-shucks-can't-win-em-all schtick and quietly steer the media onto his next stunt. Its getting really tedious.