Can't pass this one up. Burt Rutan has said repeatedly that once the X-Prize was funded, he would go after it. He developed the Proteus aircraft several years ago for a different purpose, but there have always been rumors that it might serve as the first stage for a suborbital vehicle. The rumors have finally been born out.

They made an announcement today. This will be a big boost in the credibility of others going after this market.

Amazing, what a cool looking ship. I wonder if any other X-Prize competitors have any surprises in store.

May this year bring many more such surprises. Next year in LEO!

I'm skeptical about private business operating in space without proper government oversight. We need an agency similiar to the FAA to ensure the safety of such vehicles before they take private citizens. A moratorium should be placed on private spacecraft development until the regulations can be finalized.

A space-troll -- sort of like the Great Galatic Ghoul -- this is a first!

"government oversight." "moratorium . . . regulations."

What utter, steaming B.S.! Such ideas are part of the reason we're still earthbound, with a privileged few going up at a cost of billions.

BTW, I always love it when someone who posts doesn't even have the courage of their convictions to identify themselves.

That being said, it look's cool. I wish them every success!

I wonder if it is Marx4ever ? ;)

People like him won't be happy until the red flag is flying on the red planet.

If anyone can do this, it's Burt Rutan. He's the greatest aircraft designer of the last 50 years.

Believe it or not, the day I heard about the X-prize the first thought I had was, "Burt Rutan is going to win that."

Note how close they are to actually doing this. Those aren't mockups or 1/3 scale prototypes we're looking at. Those are the *real vehicles that will be used for the flights. The 'mother ship' has been in flight test for six months already, and uses the exact same avionics and control systems the spaceship uses. Brilliant.

And I love Burt's solution to handling re-entry angles and speeds - turn the craft into a very high drag 'shuttlecock' that is self-stabilizing and slows itself down very rapidly.

When he pulls this off, for a total of a few million bucks, it's going to really highlight what a white elephant NASA is. These guys can't even finalize a paper design after a couple of decades of trying and billions of dollars. Rutan does it with 20 guys in a hangar in the mojave in two years. All the way to flying craft.

Bet he goes to orbit after this, too.

One of the unfortunate facts of modern life is that developing industries outrun their ethical and legal considerations.

For example, If an asteroid mining operation dislodged a big enough chunk of rock that its impact/shock wave damaged life and property on Earth would the company be responsible?

What if a returning Mars probe brought back a virus because the launching company didn't want to spend money on quarantine procedures?

What if the space plane is destroyed by space junk leftover from a communication satellite launch? Who is liable - (e.g.) Scaled Composites or (e.g.) ATT? How does the insurance get paid out?

We do not have a developed body of space law.

A company, just like the US government, is a group of people .... and therefore subject to any and all unsavory behaviors that humans have to offer : pride to the point of hubris; shunning engineering advice in favor of profits; ignoring safety standards on the grounds that "Everybody Else Does IT!"; and all sorts of assorted groupthink.

Reason to quit? - no.
Reason enough to procede with caution? - HELL YES.

PS.

It does look cool.

Fair sailing and Godspeed home.

I can't wait to see private industry in space; I'm just worried I won't see much new advancements in space exploration in my lifetime.

Oh, and Glenn Reynolds puts puppies in blenders. Pass it on.

I can't express how unbelievably happy this story makes me. Although obviously we have to wait to see if the test flight actually succeeds, I can't believe how far along he is.

I'm also a little upset I didn't hear about it right away--one of my readers had to tip me off. But who cares?

I'm glad Rutan kept it so quiet. We need to keep the government as far away from this as possible. Not that it would really matter, since he'd just leave the U.S. to get it done if it got to be a problem. But it's best to stay low-profile to keep the control freaks of the world at bay. And the competition. ;-)

While space will eventually need legislation, it definitely doesn't need that now. Especially not any form of regulation, which is the worst.

Insurance companies exist to insure difficult situations. We can worry about someone pitching an asteroid at the Earth when the time comes for that.

I'm amused that some people's minds instinctively seek some sort of controlling authority for things like this. We'll get to that when the time is proper.

Go Burt!!!

I had heard a rumor a few months back that Rutan was aiming to have his suborbital ready to go in time for Oskosh 2004 (imagine -that- thing showing up at an airshow) --- maybe he's ready to do it for '03.

Plus, I like the fact our next American space traveller will have overly-large sideburns.

> One of the unfortunate facts of modern life is that developing industries outrun their ethical and legal considerations.

That is so wrong.

Regulators of developing industries don't provide any value. They can't, because they can't predict the future and they don't have any relevant experience to draw upon. Moreover, they're not supposed to. They're promoted by folks who have a vested interest in killing developing industries. They're luddites of the worst kind.

Disagree - feel free to provide examples where regulators of "developing industries" or folks proposing said regulations behaved differently.

Since you can't, tell us why this time will be different.

I think that Adriane has some valid points. On the other hand, I think we have plenty of time to think about what the legal aspects of private space will be without necessarily bringing everything to a screaming halt. It should be a few decades before we have to worry about private asteroid mining or Mars probe operations, and for the forseeable future we won't even have to worry about space junk issues since none of the current private space vehicles are going into orbit.

Sure, we need to start thinking about these things. But for now, as long as you launch over the ocean so you don't hit anyone if something happens and your crew signs releases for everything, you should be all right. I'm sure someone out there will insure you if you have some good engineering data to back up your vehicle and you can pay them enough.

I have to say that I'm opposed to any regulation of private launch vehicles at this time, other than requiring them to abide by reasonable rules about range safety. Let's wait until we see what shape the industry is going to take before we talk about making rules for it.

In regards to surprises:
There are others, who have tested hardware but are keeping it under quite tight wraps.
And J. Carmack just said in his weekly update, that all things considered, they still think they have a chance of beating Rutan to the X-prize.

Oh, and for "of the current private space vehicles are going into orbit.", thats wrong. SpaceX Falcon most certainly is aimed at orbit, this year. Unmanned though.

>SpaceX Falcon most certainly is aimed at orbit, >this year.

Neat. I stand corrected. It still shouldn't be a big deal if you have insurance and just have your crew sign releases for everything.

Dear Andy -

why does Air Traffic Control keep airplanes about 4 miles apart when landing?

Since this limits the number of airplanes that can use a airport, and therefore, limits the profit the airport and airlines can experience why don't we drop that regulation and let airplanes 1/4 mile apart.

Profit is good, no?
So 16 times the profit must surely be better?

Adriane

As for the covering of accidents, I believe that the government already has a regulation that any US spacecraft and satelites that do damage to other contries will be covered by the American taxpayer. (Please correct my if I am wrong.) As for the rest of the regulation gambit, the system is errors way too far on the side of caution. A good example is Kistler aerospace, they are a private company that is struggling to create a two stage RLV and were driven out of the United States to Australia due to complicated regulations that drove development costs through the roof. If our country does not get its act together, other countries will be the space hubs of the future.

- Gus

> why does Air Traffic Control keep airplanes about 4 miles apart when landing?

Dear Adriane

What color is the sky in your world?

In my world, ATC came about long after the airline industry - the ATC system isn't regulation of a developing industry, the topic at hand. (The Wrights, and others, flew long before ATC.)

I'll repeat my question - when have regulations of DEVELOPING industry provided any benefits? If never, why will this time be any different?

Airliners are kept well separated - the distance varies according to the weigh classification of the aircraft - because of wake turbulence primarily from trailing wing tip vortices. Thes are quite strong enough to flip a too closely following plane inverted. Quite a lot of lives were lost before these rules were applied.

As for profit, I think these definitions are about right.
Businessman - a person who would allow a million people to die if he could make $10 on the deal.
Enterpreneur - a person who would *cause* a million people to die if he could make $10 on the deal.

As long as reasonably clean fuels are used and the wannabe astronauts are willing to take responsibility for their own lives - or deaths - then good luck to them.
My money is on Burt Rutan being the first - some of the others will certainly die - if they ever get off the ground at all.