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First private space flight to take off

SpaceShipOne is to rocket to 100 kilometers (62 miles) above the Mojave desert. If successful, it will demonstrate that the space frontier is finally open to private enterprise. This event could "usher in a new, low-cost era in space travel,” Rutan said.

SpaceShipOne was designed by Rutan and his research team at the California-based aerospace company, Scaled Composites. Rutan made aviation news in 1986 by developing the Voyager, the only aircraft to fly non-stop around the world without refueling.

SpaceShipOne completed a May 13 test flight in which pilot Mike Melvill reached 211,400 feet (approximately 40 miles), the highest altitude ever reached by a non-government aerospace program.

The mission is to achieve sub-orbital space flight, which means that it would leave the atmosphere but not go into orbit around the Earth. The view from a sub-orbital flight is similar to being in orbit, but the cost and risks are far less.

The pilot, to be announced at a later date, of the flight will become the first person to earn astronaut wings in a non-government sponsored vehicle, and the first private civilian to fly a spaceship out of the atmosphere.

To reach space, a carrier aircraft, the White Knight, lifts SpaceShipOne from the runway. An hour later, after climbing to approximately 50,000 feet altitude just east of Mojave, the White Knight releases the spaceship into a glide. The spaceship pilot then fires his rocket motor for about 80 seconds, reaching Mach 3 in a vertical climb. During the pull-up and climb, the pilot encounters G-forces three to four times the gravity of the earth.

SpaceShipOne then coasts up to its goal height of 100 km (62 miles) before falling back to earth. The pilot experiences a weightless environment for more than three minutes and, like orbital space travelers, sees the black sky and the thin blue atmospheric line on the horizon. The pilot (actually a new astronaut!) then configures the craft’s wing and tail into a high-drag configuration. This provides a “care-free” atmospheric entry by slowing the spaceship in the upper atmosphere and automatically aligning it along the flight path. Upon re-entry, the pilot reconfigures the ship to a glider, and then spends 15 to 20 minutes gliding back to earth, touching down like an airplane. The June flight will be flown solo, but SpaceShipOne is equipped with three seats and is designed for missions that include pilot and two passengers.

Unlike any previous manned space mission, the June flight will allow the public to view, up close, the takeoff and landing as well as the overhead rocket boost to space. Information for the general public on attending the event is available at www.scaled.com.

Based on the success of the June space flight attempt, SpaceShipOne will later compete for the Ansari X Prize, an international competition to create a reusable aircraft that can launch three passengers into sub-orbital space, return them safely home, then repeat the launch within two weeks with the same vehicle.

The Discovery Channel and Vulcan Productions are producing RUTAN’S RACE FOR SPACE (wt), a world premiere television special that documents the entire process of the historic effort to create the first privately-funded spacecraft. From design to flight testing to the moments of the actual launch and return, the special takes viewers behind-the-scenes for the complete, inside story of this historic aerospace milestone. RUTAN’S RACE FOR SPACE will be broadcast later this year.