Planetary Radio: Space Exploration, Astronomy and Science - A Special Planetary Radio: SpaceShipOne Wins the X Prize!

Episode Date: October 11, 2004

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Spaceship One and the X-Prize, this week on Planetary Radio. Welcome everyone to Public Radio's travel show that takes you to the solar system and beyond. I'm Matt Kaplan. We want to extend a special welcome to our new listeners in Ocean City, Maryland, where WSDL has just added Planetary Radio to its schedule. We hope you'll be with us every week. And what a way to get started. It's the morning of October 4, 2004, and history has just been made high above California's Mojave Desert. Here is space shuttle astronaut Rick Sirfoss. So in my official capacity as the chief judge of the Ansari X Prize competition,

I declare that Mojave Aerospace Ventures has indeed earned the Ansari X Prize. We've truly entered a new space age, one that will be defined by the art of the impossible, not of the art of the politically possible. I look forward to, after a little bit of partying with everyone else and a little bit of pondering what this really means to us to rolling up my sleeves with everyone else and bringing the opportunity for those many, many thousands of people more, the rest of you, that I want to get up there

to experience what Brian and Mike and I have experienced, to have that chance. So thank you. Thank you very much, Peter, for giving me the opportunity to witness and verify history in the making. Congratulations to everyone. Of course, Mike and Brian are Mike Melville and Brian Binney, the test pilots turned astronauts who flew Burt Rutan's Spaceship One into history.

Stay with us as we relive and reconsider their accomplishment on this special edition of Planetary Radio. Space Headlines and Emily Lakdawalla's Q&A will return next week. Mike Melville made the first of the two flights required to win the $10 million XPRIZE. Just as he had in last June's test mission, Mike flew Spaceship One to 100 kilometers, or about 62 miles. This is the somewhat arbitrary but well-accepted border between Earth and space. Flash forward to the pitch-black, cool night of October 3rd, not quite five days later. I arrived

to find the airport was already bustling with activity. 750 press passes had been issued to the international media, and most of the scores of satellite TV trucks had already taken their positions along the runway. There were parties out among the RVs parked in the desert. I crashed another one at the headquarters of X-Core, just as they were about to demonstrate a small, liquid-fueled rocket engine. If you want to see it, come on over here. You'll get a better view. Three, two, arm. Again. Doug Jones is a vice president and co-founder of X-Core,

a colleague and competitor of Burt Rutan's scaled composites at the Mojave facility. We are one of the very few companies with a high profile in the alternative space launch community who are not going for the X-Prize. We made a conscious decision about three or four years ago that it didn't really fit into a business plan, that we couldn't really justify it to an investor to say, oh, well, we might win this $10 million, but then again, we might not. And that doesn't fit into a business plan very well. But this is not to say that you guys haven't set your sights high. Oh, certainly not.

We see space tourism as a very lucrative emerging market. The fact that people have spent on the order of $10 million apiece to take a two-week vacation to the International Space Station shows that the giggle factor has gone away, that it really is plausible to charge people money to do a space flight. And it's plausible to provide it as a private service rather than something where you have to become a NASA astronaut in order to get a chance to fly in space. Not far away, 200 volunteers were receiving their assignments for the night and for the early morning launch.

More than 500 people had applied to the Ansari X-Prize Foundation for the chance to stay up all night and help out. Alan Phillips was there with his wife. They had just arrived from Vancouver, British Columbia, where they had made a snap decision to fly down and see Spaceship One take to the air. And now suddenly we're crew. So we just made this decision to come down here yesterday, and now we're volunteer crew. So 36 hours ago, you had no idea you would be wearing this yellow volunteer shirt,

much less be standing in the desert. No, 26 hours ago, we hadn't even purchased tickets and didn't even know about this. Unlike the volunteers, I squeezed in a few hours of sleep, returning to the airport at 4 a.m. The sun wouldn't rise for hours, but the XPRIZE folks were already serving up a hot breakfast. Just a few minutes later, I recognized the father of the feast strolling along the edge of the tarmac. It was space entrepreneur Peter Diamandis, creator of the X-Prize and president

of the Ansari X-Prize Foundation. You got the 10 million in your pocket? I got a check ready. You got the 10 million in your pocket, Peter? I got a check ready. Absolutely. This has been a nine-year journey, and we're here at the top of the mountain. Today, if all goes well, the weather is beautiful. We have a ship that's fueled out on the ramp. It's scaled.

Venus is on the horizon, and a waning gibbous moon up there. It's a beautiful day for spaceflight. It's a great day to go to space. Absolutely. Where do you guys go from here? We go, this is the beginning. This is actually the very beginning of a great adventure for all of us. After the Ansari X-Prize is won, and I hope that will be the case today,

we move towards the X-Prize Cup, which is an annual event where we're going to be having, hopefully, spaceships not flying twice inside of two weeks, but two, three, four flights a day as we head towards the Grand Prix of space. And that's our goal is in New Mexico, an event that will bring the ships all together and use the model of Grand Prix racing in space. So it's going to be like, I mean, one of your people compared it to Oshkosh, that great gathering of experimental aircraft. Absolutely.

It's going to be a combination of sort of the Indy 500 meets Oshkosh meets the America's Cup with rocket ships and rocket engines. You've been at this for so many years now. And, you know, you were talking about an XPRIZE even before you'd found the money. Now it sure looks like it's all come together. It has. Miraculously, it's come together with a huge amount of work by so many people. And, you know, we're ready to go, ready to start this personal spaceflight revolution.

Are you even a little surprised by the amount of attention that this has gathered? I mean, look at all the media coverage here. It's great. Well, I guess I'm thankful that it's worked because this was the goal. And to change the way, you the way kids think about space, the adults think about space, as an option, a possibility that all of us can have on a continuous basis. Well, we look forward to seeing you hand that check to Paul Allen and Bert Rutan. Absolutely. And that will happen in, so many of them win today,

that will happen in St. Louis on November the 6th is the goal. Just a few steps from Peter stood Patty Grace Smith, Associate Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration, where she heads the Commercial Space Transportation Office. I've been working with Peter Diamandis and the Foundation since 1995. And we see our role as helping to facilitate opportunities like this that enable the public to understand and see more about what space is going to be about, what the possibilities of space are, and to just kind of ignite and spark the enthusiasm for space.

Now, is this a new sign of the role for the FAA? Because I think most of us think of the FAA as a regulatory agency. The rest of the FAA does not have promotion in its mission, but we do. And we take it very, very seriously. The administrator embraces that. She helps us promote and facilitate the industry in every way possible. So we're very excited about her being here, too, to show the total FAA support for this industry. Well, I've always had a dream that space would evolve into a full-fledged form of transportation, not unlike aviation, not unlike highways or any other form of transportation.

And I see that happening. I think this is the beginning of it. Once reusable launch vehicles, which we have the authority to license, are in place, and then passenger carriage comes after that, people traveling to and from space and getting to a routine basis where they travel frequently. They experience space in many, many ways. That is transportation. Space is a destination. Do you get any feeling like we're of deja vu, Ford Trimotors and DC3s and things like that back in the 20s and 30s? Absolutely.

Absolutely. I can't tell you the adrenaline that's rushing through my system today because this is kind of the culmination of years of work to get to the point where we can have a venue like the X-Prize and X-Prize Cup that will follow it, that will showcase the accomplishments and the possibilities of space. showcase the accomplishments and the possibilities of space. It was a great morning to go to space. Unlike the June test flight, when 60-mile-an-hour winds threw sand in our faces, this night had remained calm. The moon had risen in the crystal-clear sky,

and I can't remember when it or nearby Venus had ever been brighter or more beautiful. The eastern horizon was just turning orange and pink as Spaceship One rolled slowly past us, slung under the belly of the surreal-appearing White Knight. This time it was Mike Melville's job to fly the mothership to 50,000 feet and then release the tiny rocket plane. We had learned only the night before that Brian Binney would fly Spaceship One this morning. Binney would rely on 21 years of flight test experience, most of those spent in the Navy.

Either by coincidence or due to Burt Rutan's careful planning, the White Knight would scream past us toward the sky just as the sun peeked over the distant hills. Twin turbojet engines of White Knight carrying Spaceship One into the Sierra Nevada mountain range here. The fog sunrise is exactly right now. There it is. There's sunshine coming up on the high desert. Spaceship One, White Knight are airborne. It would be an hour before the mated aircraft and their chase planes reached the release point. As they climbed, they would eventually disappear from the naked eye,

but we could watch their contrails slowly inch across the sky. Finally, when they were nearly nine and a half miles over our heads. Good release. Good release. You see the separate con. The rocket motor's going. There it goes, folks. Go, Brian, go. Suddenly, a new contrail veered away at tremendous speed. And even without binoculars, you could see the 60-foot orange flame

pushing Brian Binney up through the stratosphere toward vacuum. 100,000 feet. 170. 20 seconds to go. 200,000 feet, there's shutdown. Right now he's Mach 3 in the climb. Coasting uphill at 220,000 feet, Mach 3 in the climb. Brian, sounds great, systems are green.

84-second burn, shutdown was clean, systems are green. 300,000. Feathers up. 328,000 feet. And with that, we knew Spaceship One had made it at least to its goal of 100 kilometers. And still the ship rose, carried by inertia, finally reaching nearly 370,000 feet, 70 miles above the Earth. Brian's feeling great. Systems are green.

He's in complete feather, coasting uphill, standing by for apogee. So far, no unscripted maneuvers today. Entry point is good. He's on his way down. And then, before we knew it, the rocket plane was back before us on the ground, towed by nothing more high-tech than a pickup truck. With the spaceship as a backdrop, Peter Diamandis knew it was time for the real celebration to begin. Today, history was made. It is our pleasure, let's get the champagne here ready. Let's invite on to stage Paul Allen, Bert Rutan, Brian Binney, Mike Melville.

Where are you, Mike? Here's Bert Rutan. The last thing that I said to Brian before we closed up the door around 6 o'clock this morning was to use the driver, keep your head down, and swing smooth. And I'd like to say to Brian right now, nice drive. I am also very proud to say that we did indeed go after beating the X-15's record, which was set in 1963, and we beat it by about 13,000 feet. Bert, how does it feel to be a furry mammal among the dinosaurs of the old aerospace industry? They've got to be a little bit worried right now, don't you think?

You know, I was thinking a little bit about what they are feeling, they being that other space agency. that other space agency. And, you know, quite frankly, I think the big guys, the Boeings, the Lockheeds, the Naysay people at Houston, they probably, based on stuff that's been out, probably think we're a bunch of home builders that put a rocket in a long easy. I think they're looking at each other now and saying, we're screwed.

Because I'll tell you something, I have a hell of a lot bigger goal than they do. And you know what that goal is? I absolutely have to develop a manned space tourism system for Sir Richard Branson that's at least a hundred times safer than anything that's ever flown manned to space, and probably a lot more. I have to do that. There were many other individuals to congratulate, including billionaire Paul Allen. It was Allen and Rutan who created Mojave Space Ventures, but it was Allen who paid the bills, and it

was Allen who cut the deal with Sir Richard Branson, the British tycoon who has commissioned Mojave Space Ventures to build Spaceship Two. Without Peter's vision of actually setting up the XPRIZE, without Paul putting a lot of financial support behind it and his total commitment, and then without Bert and his team actually designing it, we wouldn't all be standing here today. It's been a magnificent achievement. Virgin Galactic Airways was born a week ago.

Three years from now, BERT has promised to deliver a five-seater spacecraft to take people into space. And hopefully it will be the start of a lot of people being able to enjoy space, which has never really happened before. And so we look forward to that. Thanks for coming. It's been fun. Thank you. And so we look forward to that. Thanks for coming. It's been fun. Thank you. Sir Richard Branson, joining the winners and the providers of the Ansari X Prize on the morning of October 4, 2004. We'll give Peter Diamandis the last word. Here's how he began a press conference two hours after Spaceship One touched down.

Today's October 4th. It's no surprise that Bert chose this day. Today's October 4th. It's no surprise that Bert chose this day. It's the anniversary of Sputnik in 1957. And it was that flight that began a race that got us to the moon, the U.S. against the Soviet Union. Well, today we conclude the new race to space that has done far more than that, perhaps. It's gotten us into space irreversibly, cheaply, reliably,

and in such a cool-looking ship, I can't believe. Two down, none to go. Hats off to the Mojave Aerospace team. I thank you guys for helping making this dream come true. We have a lot of very exciting announcements from some wonderful people here today. Thank you all for coming here. Please share this with the world. Our reason for being here is to motivate and excite kids around the planet to know that you can dream, you can dare, you can take risks. Make your dreams come true.

Don't stop because someone says they can't happen. In fact, they can. If you believe it hard enough, go for it. You can make your dreams happen. We saw that here today. Thank you all very much. Peter and his colleagues went on to announce the X Prize Cup, an annual event in New Mexico that will invite all of the 26 X Prize teams to compete.

Think of it as a new space race, with everyday citizens among the winners, as we come closer to spaceflight for all. I'll be back with commentary from the Planetary Society's Executive Director, Lou Friedman, and what's up from Bruce Betts. This is Buzz Aldrin. When I walked on the moon, I knew it was just the beginning of humankind's great adventure in the solar system. That's why I'm a member of the Planetary Society, the world's largest space interest group. The Planetary Society is helping to explore Mars. We're tracking near-Earth asteroids and comets. We sponsor the search for

life on other worlds, and we're building the first-ever solar sail. You can learn about these adventures and exciting new discoveries from space exploration in the Planetary Report. The Planetary Report is the Society's full-color magazine. It's just one of many member benefits.

You can learn more by calling 1-877-PLANETS. That's toll-free, 1-877-752-6387. And you can catch up on space exploration news and developments at our exciting and informative website, planetarysociety.org. The Planetary Society, exploring new worlds. PlanetarySociety.org. The Planetary Society. Exploring new worlds. We haven't heard from Lou Friedman, the Executive Director of the Planetary Society, in a while on Planetary Radio. He joins us now, though, because I guess, Lou, you've been giving some thought to the significance of Spaceship One and the X-Prize.

Yes, thanks, Matt, and thanks to all of our devoted listeners here of Planetary Radio as well. This is a very admirable technical accomplishment, and Bert Rutan and his team should be congratulated for pulling off a really remarkable development so quickly, so innovatively, and so creatively. And congratulations, too, are in order for the people who organized the XPRIZE. I was one of the naysayers thinking that it would never come to pass, and they did make it come to pass, and they were very creative and deserve a lot of congratulations for this effort. While I think it's a great technical accomplishment, I'm not quite as enthusiastic about the prospects

for commercial development. I regard this something like barnstorming in the early aviation days. It was a tremendous for getting public interest in. It was a tremendous advancement to the whole idea of understanding aviation, but it really didn't change aviation. That took World War I and the development of postal service by air to really make changes in aviation. I think the same will happen in space. There are going to be developments that will happen that will advance commercial space. But the idea of space barnstorming being the one that does it, I think, will be much more problematical. There will be failures. There will be setbacks. There will be accidents. We have to be prepared for all of that. Some of the enthusiasts may not

be like to hear that, but they're not going to be any more perfect than the rest of us who have been pushing space exploration on so many fronts for so long. Thanks very much, Lou. Let me ask you, if Richard Branson came in and gave you a ticket on one of those 2007 flights, would you be on Spaceship Two? You know, Pan Am was taking bookings 30 years ago for space also, and of, we know what happened to Pan Am. I think the same is going to happen with Richard Branson's idea. So I probably sign up for it knowing that I really don't expect it to happen. Well, I hope he surprises you with one of those tickets. I hope so too. Thanks. Lou Friedman is the Executive Director of the Planetary Society, and he joins us now and then here on Planetary Radio.

Radio. Time for What's Up with Bruce Betts. Dr. Bruce Betts, the Director of Projects for the Planetary Society. Bruce, welcome back. Thank you very much. Did you have fun out there in the desert? I had the best time. I imagine that was obvious from what people just heard, but I loved it. It was a great time was had by all, I think it's safe to say, and it was a tremendous event. I hope I get to go back sometime. We're thinking of stationing you in the desert permanently, Matt. They've tried, but no one has succeeded. I would love

a ride, actually. That's what I want to do. I want to hitch a ride with Bert or Mike Melville or one of those guys. Okay. Well, maybe if you tell them you want to interview them while they're going into space, I'm sure that'll be good enough. I hope so. Okay, good.

Don't think I haven't considered it. I mean, in all seriousness, congratulations to the Spaceship One team. And I think what's really exciting about it is how much it has been exciting the public about space. Yeah. Which is kind of what we like to do, too. You bet. You know, they're not going to Mars. No, they're not actually even getting close.

No, they're not really. You do realize that, right? It's 65 miles. That's, what, about a third of the way to Mars, I think. Yeah, 65 miles, 60 million miles, you know, what's a two zeros? That's right. Venus, still the brightest star-like object up there, looking in the pre-dawn sky. Still no planets playing with us in the evening.

So just for you pre-dawn people, go see Venus. Can't miss it. If you look far above Venus to the upper right, you may see Saturn. Saturn actually now rising in the very late night, about 11 p.m. in the east-northeast. And Jupiter will start to appear as the month goes along. You'll start to be able to see it far to the lower left of Venus, looking also extremely bright, not quite as bright as Venus, but very bright. Easy to see.

On to this week in space history. A very significant date, especially these days. October 15, 1997, the Cassini-Huygens spacecraft was launched. Cassini, of course, now playing in the Saturnian system. And we'll have some Cassini guests coming up in the next few weeks as they go for another Titan encounter on October 26th. And then the Huygens probe entering the atmosphere on January 14th of this coming year. Lots of exciting stuff coming up regarding that landing of the Huygens probe. And we'll be telling people more about that in coming weeks.

Stay tuned. That's right. On to Random Space Fact. Did you know, Matt, as comets approach the sun, of course, they develop tails. These tails can actually be so long, they can stretch from the orbit of one planet to the orbit of another. We're talking many tens of millions of miles long at times sometimes more i did not know that i knew they were long but boy you're talking long we're talking way long wow who says size doesn't matter uh yes so anyway how about we move on to this week's trivia contest and pull it together.

You stunned me. I'm sorry, Matt. It's one of those cases where I had so many things I had to edit that it just clogged my brain. I could see them racing through your one lobe to another up there, but you're carrying on. So we asked everyone a couple weeks ago who were the first people to fly into space on their rocket entering space without pressurized suits, without any spacesuits? How did we do, Matt? We got a couple of answers. A lot of people, but they either had one answer or the other.

And there were a few people who thought that there was an American team, Gemini 7. But actually, they got beat out. It was, as we heard from Michael Lermont of Sarnia, Ontario, Canada, our winner this week. It was three Soviet cosmonauts in Voskhod 1, Komarov, Fyokhtistov, oh boy, and Yagorov. And there was a good reason that they did it, too. Actually, it was. Yegorov. And there was a good reason that they did it, too. Actually, it was a lousy reason, right? Indeed. In Voskhod 1, and at least as the story goes, Voskhod 1 was designed basically for two people,

but they wanted to be the first to send three into space, so they couldn't fit them all in the capsule if they left pressurized spacesuits on them. So that's why they went in shirt sleeves. At least that's the story. You're sticking to it. I'm sticking to it. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it. Well, Michael, up there in Ontario, you're going to be getting that Planetary Radio T-shirt,

and we congratulate you. How about this coming week? For this coming week, we're asking you the following question to win your glorious Planetary Radio t-shirt. Where in the solar system will you find Uruk Sulcus? That's right, ladies and gentlemen. Uruk Sulcus.

Where will you find that? What planetary body? Uruk Sulcus. Exactly. And go to planetary.org slash radio to find out how to email us with your answer and take your chance at randomly winning from your correct answer a Planetary Radio t-shirt. Be the envy of all your friends. I want to say one more thing, Matt. I know you have, but I want to also welcome our new listeners from WSDL in Ocean City, Maryland. Which is a great town, by the way.

I've stayed there a couple of times on vacation, passing through and spent a night or two. And I hope to be back someday and hear what's up from Planetary Radio. And by the way, you need to get those entries in by Monday, October 18, at noon Pacific time. That's everyone, not just those of you in the Ocean City area. Matt, how about everyone go out there, look up in the night sky, and think about eating popcorn on the boardwalk. Thank you, and good night. What a great idea. Ulrich Sulcus? Ulrich Sulcus! Well, that wasn't Ulrich Sulcus. That was Dr. Bruce Betts, the Director of Projects at the Planetary Society. He joins us every

week. I am Ulrich Sulcus! Right here with What's Up. We hope you've enjoyed our special coverage of Spaceship One winning the X Prize. Let us know what you thought of the show. Write us at

planetaryradio at planetary.org. Back to our regular format next week when we'll be joined by the director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Charles Elachi.

See you then.