I wrote a long-form post at X.
It's been exactly twenty years ago today since Burt Rutan, with money provided by the late Paul Allen, won the Ansari X-Prize with SpaceShipOne. The hope at the time was that it would lead to a robust suborbital space tourism industry, allowing hundreds or thousands of people to…
— Not-So-OK Boomer (@Rand_Simberg) October 4, 2024
The federal government is long past due for a downsizing. In some cases that can be accomplished by a shuffle, such as transferring the duties of FAA-AST (but not the personnel) to Space Force.
I hope the the right space nerds are positioning themselves for a place in the next Trump administration. Presidents have a lot going on and need reliable people in and out of the administration to get things like this done
Ditto. Assuming Trump wins. Otherwise it will be another four years of delay and review and other fishy business.
Do you really want me to have to move to Washington?
According to post Rand linked to the other day, you can work from home
I agree with you Rand on the VG architecture vs. XCOR.
The extendable wings that convert Spaceship 1&2 from rocket ship to shuttlecock to flyable glider give me concern about how much margin is available during conversion and flight stability during that time. You wouldn’t want to get stuck with the wings in some halfway configuration. Also as you’ve mentioned before, the hybrid propulsion system seems unnecessarily restrictive and troublesome and not that much simpler versus a more straightforward liquid design.
If I were in pursuit of a suborbital experience, I’d be more likely to go the New Shepard route. The Blue Origin system just seems to have more (and better) margins to me.
But as you point out, with orbital not that far away, what is there truly to enjoy via a suborbital experience?
If point-to-point Starship becomes a reality, its primary purpose won’t be for joy rides once it gets past the demo stage. And that seems to be a viable market possibility.