Yet another first for...

steingar

steingar

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steingar
Virgin Galactic and Scaled Composites, with the first independent flight of Spaceship Two, as reported by CNN.
 
NASA heroes did that stuff years ago.:rolleyes2:
 
You mean Air Force heroes? NASA was never able to field a rocketplane (unless you count Shuttle that launches straight up). Actually, they can't even build an expendable rocket anymore.
-- P.
 
I understand these are just the first steps, and that NASA began similarly, but whats the big deal of an up-and-down flight (for lack of a better term)? What I mean is, why would anyone pay 100's of thousands of dollars to do what could be done in the vomit comet? WHats the difference between the 2 besides altitude, anyway? So you can say you have "technically" crossed an arbitrary altitude which defines the edge of space?

I'm sorry if I sound negative about this. There is tremendous value in what these folks are doing, but I don't see any attractive commercial aspect until a fare-paying passenger could go into orbit once or twice.
 
If had that kind of money to throw around, I'd sign up.
 
jasc15 said:
I understand these are just the first steps, and that NASA began similarly, but whats the big deal of an up-and-down flight (for lack of a better term)? What I mean is, why would anyone pay 100's of thousands of dollars to do what could be done in the vomit comet? WHats the difference between the 2 besides altitude, anyway? So you can say you have "technically" crossed an arbitrary altitude which defines the edge of space?

I'm sorry if I sound negative about this. There is tremendous value in what these folks are doing, but I don't see any attractive commercial aspect until a fare-paying passenger could go into orbit once or twice.
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It's the same sort of fee-paying situation that lets people climb Everest. They're willing to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for bragging rights.

Ron Wanttaja
 
You could pay the Russians $20 million and they will take you to the space station.
 
ScottM said:
So no more Atlas or Delta? When did that happen?
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Well, maybe he means design - they've had some delays on the Ares program, and it's on the chopping block, I think. At least it was, but I haven't been paying attention the last few months. Anyone know better?
 
chucky said:
Well, maybe he means design - they've had some delays on the Ares program, and it's on the chopping block, I think. At least it was, but I haven't been paying attention the last few months. Anyone know better?
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Perhaps that is what he meant. I had heard that Atlas V was launched for the first time earlier this year. Delta has been a mainstay as well for decades. Even Titan, although technically USAF administered, is still a great platform.
 
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The Atlas V has been around for more than a year, although I think it is the youngest in the Atlas family. A mission I've done some work with launched on one in February.
 
ScottM said:
So no more Atlas or Delta? When did that happen?
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ULA rockets weren't designed by NASA or even paid for by NASA. They were born from the Pentagon's EELV program. After the incompetents from NASA Marshall Space Flight Center demonstrated their inability to rearrange Shuttle remains into anything worthwhile, Obama told them to get back to basics. Meanwhile Johnson Center people will buy rides on SpaceX and Boeing capsules... lofted by the Atlas and Delta. By the way, during the Griffin regime, if anyone proposed to launch anything crewed on Atlas, he was shown the door immediately. It's one big reason t/Space didn't get COTS money: they wanted to make 4 initial flights on Atlas. The comparison with non-NASA rockets Atlas and Delta was demonstrating how low NASA was falling under Griffin while Bush took the "hands-off" approach.

NASA is not equal to American spaceflight, and a good thing too, because it became the worst of American spaceflight and an anchor around our necks. Things went so bad that people who paid any attention now cheer Branson's silly rocketplane just because it may -- some day in very distant future! -- offer a hope to bypass NASA and finally accomplish something in space. Oh and a funny thing: Branson is British, not Ameircan.

-- Pete
 
I'm going to wait to see what happens with Ares before I write NASA off, but it certainly seems true that NASA lost a great deal of the institutional expertise they built up in the sixties, seventies, and eighties.
 
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