Seattle Times June 22, 2004
Allen's rocket soars
By Andrew Garber
MOJAVE, Calif. - Michael Melvill earned his astronaut wings yesterday, but it wasn't easy.
The 63-year-old test pilot flew SpaceShipOne to an altitude of 62 miles, marking the first time a privately financed, manned rocket ship has left the Earth's atmosphere.
A mechanical glitch, however, made the trip a bit hairy. The craft became difficult to control because of a trim problem with the tail, but Melvill said backup systems worked and allowed him to safely complete the flight.
On his return trip to Earth, "you got the feeling that if you did anything wrong, you might really hurt yourself," Melvill said.
Burt Rutan, who oversaw construction of the craft, called the trim issue "the most serious flight-safety-control problem we've had in the entire program."
It caused the spaceship to go 22 miles off course in a matter of seconds, and the craft did not re-enter the atmosphere at the planned location. Even so, SpaceShipOne was able to glide back to the Mojave airport and make a smooth landing.
To the estimated 11,000 people staring up at SpaceShipOne from the Mojave Desert, everything seemed to go without a hitch.
A carrier jet named White Knight, which resembles a giant insect, took off about 6:45 in the morning with SpaceShipOne hooked to its belly. Within five minutes, the plane became a white speck in the sky.
After climbing for an hour, the spaceship was released and its engines ignited. A white contrail could be seen high in the sky as the craft accelerated to Mach 3. Monitoring data indicated the ship made it to an elevation of 62 miles, officially putting it in space.
Melvill was weightless for about three minutes and did an experiment that wasn't part of the official flight plan.
"When I got to apogee, I stopped flying and reached into my pocket and pulled out some candy-coated chocolate and let them go in front of my face. They just spun around like little sparkly things. I was so blown away I couldn't even fly the airplane," he said.
At peak altitude, he could see the black of space and the blue curve of Earth. "It was like nothing I've ever seen before," he said.
The way back down
The craft does not go fast enough to put it into orbit. Melvill quickly re-entered the atmosphere with the craft's twin tails folded up for a shuttlecock effect to slow its speed.
"I was not afraid all the way up, but I was a little afraid on the way down," said Melvill, who has logged more than 6,400 hours of flight time in 111 fixed-wing aircraft and seven helicopters.
The spaceship re-enters the atmosphere at about 1,500 miles per hour, heating the hull to 800 degrees for a brief period, according to Dave Moore, the SpaceShipOne project manager for Vulcan. Billionaire Paul Allen financed construction of the spaceship, and Vulcan is his investment company.
The spacecraft was noisy coming back at such a high speed, Melvill said. "It has a very high-pitched roar that's very intimidating," he said.
He later reconfigured the ship back into a normal glider and landed it like an airplane on the same runway where it took off.
Allen, who spent more than $20 million to build the spaceship, and Rutan greeted Melvill as he bounded out of the craft.
"I had my heart in my throat when I watched the launch," Allen said.
After it landed, the spaceship was towed up and down the runway for spectators to see. Melvill was on top, at one point holding a sign given to him by the crowd that read "SpaceShipOne - Government zero."
Rutan has been critical of NASA in the past, saying private industry will soon leapfrog the agency in manned space flight.
He predicts it won't be long before entrepreneurs around the world build suborbital spacecraft and begin "barnstorming," much like airplane enthusiasts did in the early 1900s.
It may take craft larger than SpaceShipOne to make suborbital tourism viable - something that could hold six people or more and go farther into space, Rutan said.
SpaceShipOne is the leading contender for the $10 million Ansari X Prize. The award will go to the first company that can launch a craft capable of carrying three people into suborbital space, return safely and do it again within two weeks using the same vehicle. Several private groups are in contention for the prize.
On the horizon
SpaceShipOne may be just the first step for Rutan.
In a recent interview, the veteran aircraft designer said he hopes to build a more powerful spaceship that can break free of Earth's gravity and go into orbit.
The feat can be accomplished relatively cheaply and within a matter of years, Rutan said, if he can find the financial backing.
"I will be doing, in a research area, orbital vehicles, and I'll be building something to go to Mars," he said. "I do things fast because I'm already 61 years old."
While many observers think a suborbital space-tourism industry may be possible, there are doubts when it comes to private industry tackling orbital space flight.
Every time a private company has tried, "They've basically built one rocket, it's blown up, and the company has gone bankrupt," said John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, a defense- and space-policy consulting group in Alexandria, Va.
Orbital space flight is more difficult because "You need to put about 10 times the amount of power into a launch vehicle to achieve orbital flight, [compared] to suborbital. With 10 times the amount of power comes 10 times the number of problems," said Michael Lembeck, part of NASA's team working on manned flights to the moon and Mars.
It means developing a spaceship capable of reaching hypersonic speeds, operating in a vacuum, supporting life and surviving the heat of re-entry, he said.
Allen said he's not likely to be the sole financial backer for building a private orbital spaceship. "The cost rises hugely when you go into orbit," he said.
"It's not something I'm sure I would undertake by myself. Maybe there's a group of people who would be stimulated by SpaceShipOne and the X Prize stuff. A group of us could get together for something like that."
For now, Allen has a working suborbital rocket ship, which he and Rutan say proves that space flight is no longer something only big government agencies can do.
"Milestones like this don't happen that often," Allen said.
© Copyright 2004, The Seattle Times Company
