07-22-2011, 05:34 PM
Burt Rutan has not stopped daring. Google 'SpaceShipOne' and see what you get! I was there in Mojave the day Mike Melville got his astronaut 'wings', and I stood less than a hundred yards away as they pulled the spacecraft down the runway following the flight...on the tow hitch of a beatup old truck. Burt Rutan and Paul Allen (of Microsoft fame) were riding in the back of the truck with their legs hanging off the tailgate and the pilot was sitting straddled atop the spacecraft. Granted it was only a suborbital flight, but it was ready to go again THE NEXT DAY and could have been readied for a second flight that afternoon. With a rocket motor powered by laughing gas (nitrous oxide) and rubber, it's pretty dern cool. I imagine that's what the barnstorming days of flight must have been like. Daring men in their flying machines...
I'll see if I can't dig out a few of my pictures from that day.
Galen
I'll see if I can't dig out a few of my pictures from that day.
Galen
I may not be a rivet counter, but I sure do like rivets!