A new record...

The unoffical apogee call for SpaceShipOne today was 368,000' [1]; if my
sums are right, the previous X-15 record was about 355,000'. Looks like
a pretty good flight from here.

4% over isn't bad... now, bets on it being broken before the end of the
year? Decent chance, I'd guess.

(The previous flight was 337,600'; the first SS1 suborbital was
328,491')

[1] http://www.spaceflightnow.com/ss1/status.html

--
-Andrew Gray

Andrew Gray wrote:
The unoffical apogee call for SpaceShipOne today was 368,000' [1]; if
my
sums are right, the previous X-15 record was about 355,000'. Looks
like
a pretty good flight from here.

4% over isn't bad... now, bets on it being broken before the end of
the
year? Decent chance, I'd guess.


Better than at any time since the mid-1960s! But I wonder if
SS1 will be flown again any time soon after today...

- Ed Kyle

On 4 Oct 2004 08:19:25 -0700, in a place far, far away,
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a
way as to indicate that:

4% over isn't bad... now, bets on it being broken before the end of
the
year? Decent chance, I'd guess.


Better than at any time since the mid-1960s! But I wonder if
SS1 will be flown again any time soon after today...

If I were Paul Allen, I'd commission a higher-performance engine, and
try to set some additional altitude records, to make it more
interesting for the future competitors. It would be a pretty low-cost
thing to do, on the margin, and encourage the development of a better
engine (perhaps a liquid this time?).

There's another suborbital record. I think it is owned
by Vasili Lazarev and Oleg Makarov who reached at least 192 km
(~630,000 feet) (according to some reports) during their aborted Soyuz
18a flight in 1975. Virgil Grissom made the highest *planned*
suborbital flight in 1961 during the MR-4 mission. Gus topped out at
something like 190.3 km (624,000 feet or 118 plus miles).

- Ed Kyle

There's another suborbital record. I think it is owned
by Vasili Lazarev and Oleg Makarov who reached at least 192 km
(~630,000 feet) (according to some reports) during their aborted Soyuz
18a flight in 1975. Virgil Grissom made the highest *planned*
suborbital flight in 1961 during the MR-4 mission. Gus topped out at
something like 190.3 km (624,000 feet or 118 plus miles).

- Ed Kyle

Rand Simberg wrote:
On 4 Oct 2004 08:19:25 -0700, in a place far, far away,
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a
way as to indicate that:
I wonder if
SS1 will be flown again any time soon after today...

If I were Paul Allen, I'd commission a higher-performance engine, and
try to set some additional altitude records, to make it more
interesting for the future competitors. It would be a pretty
low-cost
thing to do, on the margin, and encourage the development of a better
engine (perhaps a liquid this time?).

I just heard from someone who's supposed to know (who
just returned from Mojave) that there are no plans to
fly the original SpaceShipOne again. Rutan will focus
now on the next generation vehicle development.
BTW, my source has been wrong before.

- Ed Kyle

On 4 Oct 2004 12:52:59 -0700, in a place far, far away,
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a
way as to indicate that:

I wonder if
SS1 will be flown again any time soon after today...

If I were Paul Allen, I'd commission a higher-performance engine, and
try to set some additional altitude records, to make it more
interesting for the future competitors. It would be a pretty
low-cost
thing to do, on the margin, and encourage the development of a better
engine (perhaps a liquid this time?).

I just heard from someone who's supposed to know (who
just returned from Mojave) that there are no plans to
fly the original SpaceShipOne again.

Hmmm...Smithsonian bound?

"Rand Simberg" wrote in message
...
On 4 Oct 2004 12:52:59 -0700, in a place far, far away,
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a
I just heard from someone who's supposed to know (who
just returned from Mojave) that there are no plans to
fly the original SpaceShipOne again.

Hmmm...Smithsonian bound?

Let's see, do we stick it by Voyager, the X-15, or the Spirit of St. Louis?

;-)

Jeff
--
Remove icky phrase from email address to get a valid address.

I can only guess. It makes sense that SpaceShipOne should eventually
reside in the same building with Rutan's Voyager.
A hell of an engineer, that guy.

- Ed Kyle

And while I'm thinking about private space achievement (Rutan), this
would also be a good time to to recognize the late George Koopman, the
force behind American Rocket Company - the pioneering 1980s space
start-up that initially developed the hybrid motor technology that
powered SpaceShipOne today.

(Mr. Koopman also deserves recognition both for having coordinated the
1,500 foot aerial Ford Pinto ("driven" by "Illinois Nazis"!) drop into
Chicago filmed for use in the movie "The Blues Brothers" and for having
briefly dated Carrie Fisher!)

We all have our heros ....

- Ed Kyle