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Private craft soars into space, history
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-06-22 08:47 The man who became the first person to pilot a
privately built craft into space called his flight "almost a religious
experience" after his safe landing Monday morning.
Test pilot Mike Melvill landed at Mojave Airport, about 80 miles north of Los
Angeles, California, after taking the rocket plane SpaceShipOne to an altitude
of more than 100 kilometers (62.5 miles) -- the internationally recognized
boundary of space.
Melvill told reporters he had "a hell of a view from 62 miles."
Pilot Mike Melvill
celebrates after landing SpaceShipOne. [AP] | "The
colors were pretty staggering from up there," he said.
"Looking from the Earth up there, you know, it's almost a religious
experience. It's an awesome thing to see. You can see the curvature of the
Earth. I could see all the way out, way out past the islands off the coast of
Los Angeles."
SpaceShipOne lifted off early Monday morning in the Mojave Desert, carried by
the jet White Knight.
As the pair approached 50,000 feet, SpaceShipOne decoupled from the jet.
After a brief glide, Melvill ignited the spacecraft's engines and ascended into
space at Mach 3, three times the speed of sound.
Melvill said once he reached weightlessness, he opened a bag of M&M's in
the cockpit, and the candies floated for three minutes while the ship soared
high above California.
Problems cut flight short
The spacecraft returned safely, but control problems revealed after the
flight forced Melville to cut it short and use a backup system to keep
SpaceShipOne under control.
He said trim surfaces on SpaceShipOne -- movable surfaces on the craft's
wings -- jammed during supersonic flight. The craft rolled 90 degrees twice
during its vertical ascent and veered more than 20 miles off course in a few
seconds.
Pilot Mike Melvill
is shown during SpaceShipOne's historic flight.
[cnn.com] | "Right at top, I tried to trim the
nose up, that's when I had the anomaly and had to switch to backup," he said.
The craft peaked at 328,491 feet (100.12 kilometers), just 408 feet (124 meters)
above the international boundary of space, according to Scaled Composites.
The trim surfaces were reconfigured for landing and then remained unused as
Melvill guided SpaceShipOne back to a comfortable landing.
"It was a pretty smooth ride after that," he said. "I headed back to Mojave
as fast as I could without reasonably hurting anything."
A loud bang Melvill heard during the flight appeared to be a nonessential
part of the composite airframe buckling near the rocket nozzle. The slight
indention in SpaceShipOne's exterior did not affect the craft's performance.
Melvill, 63, picked up the nation's first pair of commercial astronaut's
wings from the Federal Aviation Administration.
"We have opened the frontier of human space flight," said Pattie Grace Smith
of the FAA. "It's a major step ushering in a new era of low-cost space flight
... in reach of ordinary citizens."
The flight marks the pinnacle so far of Burt Rutan's vision of affordable,
safe, private space travel.
Rutan's company, Scaled Composites, built SpaceShipOne with financial backing
from Paul Allen, co-founder of Microsoft Corp., for a little more than $20
million. Rutan said the flight, which went from a concept in 1995 to reality
less than a decade later, was the realization of a long dream.
The White Knight
carrier airplane with SpaceShipOne tethered underneath takes-off from
Mojave Airport in California. [AFP] | "I'm so
proud of that, it brings tears to my eyes," he said.
The rocket plane made its farthest and fastest flight to date.
Rutan said he would not speculate about the problems until technical data had
been reviewed, something he expected in the next few days.
"The anomaly we had today was the most serious safety system problem we've
had in the entire program," he said. "The fact that our backup system worked and
we made a beautiful landing ... makes me feel very good."
Melvill, who has tested Rutan's planes extensively, reaffirmed Rutan's
engineering skills and commitment to safety.
"That's why we are so good at what we do," Melvill said. "We cover all the
bases."
A prelude to future flights
Those on hand for the launch included officials from NASA, the FAA, the X
Prize Foundation and the Guinness Book of Records.
Peter Diamandis, co-founder of the X Prize, the $10 million award intended to
spur civilian spaceflight, said Rutan's vision would open the door for those
with the same dream.
"This is a warm-up for the Ansari X Prize, but it's a historic moment for all
Americans," he said. "[I've heard], 'If God wanted us to fly into space, he
would have given us more money'. Hopefully, the technology demonstrated here
today will lead to designs that are cheaper and easier."
Scaled Composites is one of 24 companies from several countries competing for
the X Prize, which will go to the first privately funded group to send three
people on a suborbital flight 62.5 miles high and repeat the feat within two
weeks using the same vehicle.
Rutan said SpaceShipOne would compete for the X Prize once the causes behind
the anomalies had been resolved.
"We will be looking at all our data," he said. "We'll make a decision next
few days."
After that, preparations for an official X Prize flight are finalized will
take 60 days.
"This was not a perfect flight," Rutan said. "Then again a lot of these
things you can do with a 60-day window and easily fix them."
The nonprofit X Prize Foundation is sponsoring the contest to promote the
development of a low-cost, efficient craft for space tourism in the same way
prize competitions stimulated commercial aviation in the early 20th century.
The prize is fully funded through January 1, 2005, according to the
foundation's Web site.
Spectators witness history
SpaceShipOne flew more than 62 miles up, past the edge of space.
The remote Mojave Airport, a licensed spaceport and the world's only civilian
test flight center, also played host to an assortment of vehicles that converged
on the site from around the country.
Buses, RVs, electric scooters, small ultralights and a variety of other
vehicles were parked in the sandy soil across from the runway.
Many of the spectators said there was a feeling of history in the air. Some
said that after waiting decades, they were finally witnessing the first steps
toward spaceflight for them.
Josh Collins, 25, said he had flown from Maryland to see the attempt.
"Some people thought I was crazy, other people are jealous," he said.
Rutan mingled, talked and directed traffic with those who spent the night on
the windy Mojave Desert floor across from the airstrip Sunday night. He saved
one sign as a memento of the occasion: "SpaceShipOne;
GovernmentZero.
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