The entry I was going to make can wait. I have a new project. Because on Monday, June 21, Burt Rutan (with more than a little help from PaulAllen) is launching the first private spaceship and the launch is open to the public.
I'm not entirely sure why I am so excited about this. Rutan's not stupid enough to let the world in to see the very first flight of an untested rocket; the craft has been on previous test flights, as high as 40 miles up. This flight will be suborbital, not orbital. It will go 62 miles up, well inside the (arbitrarily defined) 100-mile boundary of space. Still, this is outside the atmosphere. If Rutan's people can do this flight twice inside two weeks, they win the X Prize. It's not John Glenn's flight, but it is Alan Shepard's. And it's launching on June 21 at about 6:30 AM from Mojave, California, which is not all that far from here.
Rudder will be out of town and it's a bit further than I really want to drive solo, so I'm trying to get someone (or several someones) to go with me. If enough people want to go, we could even rent a bus. My ideal plan would be to leave at midnight, watch the launch, come home, and work half a day. Other people I've mentioned it to keep bringnig up the idea of spending the second half of the day at Disneyland. (These would be the people who either have more vacation time or who have fewer demands on what they do have.) I do hope htis works, though, whether it's me and a friend in a car or a whole busload of geekitude.
Anybody out there want to go watch history?
Posted by dichroic at June 2, 2004 02:36 PMOh, how did I miss that this was happening? Thank you. I do wish that I could come to the launch, but I know to do so would be almost impossible, right now. Do have fun!
Posted by: Melissa at June 4, 2004 07:19 AM