After SpaceShipOne’s historic win yesterday, the X Prize becomes the X Cup. “Teams will compete in five different categories to win the overall cup: Fastest turnaround time between the first launch and second landing, maximum number of passengers per launch, total number of passengers during the competition, maximum altitude and fastest flight time.“
Tag: X Prize
OneShip to Rule Them All.
Score one for the “model builders”! SpaceShipOne won the X Prize this morning, with nary a barrel roll in sight. This is big news, indeed. Might be time to start saving up my pennies.
The Mojave Run (in less than 12 Parsecs).
Despite an unplanned and disconcerting series of barrel rolls on the way up, FlightTwo and TripOne for SpaceShipOne was a rousing success. Now, if they can repeat the feat within the next ten days, the elusive X Prize is theirs, and the business of space tourism will have reached a watershed moment. (Indeed, Richard Branson has already announced he’ll be leasing SS1 tech to kick off Virgin Galactic.) But first, they might want to figure out what’s causing that roll.
X Gonna Give it to Ya.
Aircraft designer Burt Rutan unveils SpaceShipOne, a rocket plane designed to make private space tourism affordable. The design could garner him the X Prize, to be awarded to the first privately funded manned space flight. If it works like it’s supposed to, I expect Rutan will make a good deal more than $10 million.