Word: rutan
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...PRIZE, created in 1996 by MIT graduate Peter Diamandis to make low-cost space travel accessible to the public; in Mojave, California. To win the prize, the rocket had to fly into space and return to earth twice in less than a week. According to SpaceShipOne's designer Burt Rutan, the prize covers less than half of Allen's original investment...
...flight of SpaceShipOne--brainchild of aerospace whiz Burt Rutan and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen--was hailed as a giant leap toward opening space flight to tourists. Indeed, the craft was impressively small and lightweight (about the size of an SUV) and relatively cheap (about $20 million, compared with the $400 million-plus that NASA drops on each space-shuttle launch). But don't call your travel agent just yet. Melvill made it to just the edge of space, only about a quarter of the way to the International Space Station. And he ran into a scary glitch: during...
GRANTED. THE FIRST LICENSE for a privately built rocket to take passengers on suborbital spaceflights; by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA); in Washington, D.C. The space-launch license, which was given to a California company headed by aerospace pioneer Burt Rutan, represents "a big step" toward space tourism, said FAA spokesman Henry Price. Rutan's craft, dubbed SpaceShipOne, was successfully tested on Dec. 17 last year. It reaches high altitudes slung beneath the belly of White Knight, an ungainly jet aircraft, before being launched into space. The craft is competing for the $10 million "X Prize" for the first...
...racing to develop a three-person spacecraft that could reach the edge of the atmosphere and repeat the feat within two weeks--the qualifications required to win the $10 million X Prize created by entrepreneur Peter Diamandis to encourage private spaceflight. Leading that race is legendary aerospace engineer Burt Rutan, who is gearing up for another test after his rocket plane broke the sound barrier for the first time last December. Backing Rutan--reportedly with $30 million--is Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen...