If the company manages to make two manned flights to the brink of space - 100 kilometers - within two weeks, its developers will win $10 million * for them, by the way, the pleasure has already cost over $30 million
Avi Blizovsky
The spacecraft "SpaceShipOne". You will stay at the maximum height for about three and a half minutes - photo from the test flight on May 13
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The first private spacecraft is expected to soar to a height of one hundred kilometers in the atmosphere after it is launched on June 21 from the Mojave Desert in California, said yesterday (Wednesday) the operators of the "SpaceShipOne" project, whose goal is to maintain commercial flights in space in the future.
The launch of the spacecraft will be carried out as part of the project, which is supported by the billionaire Paul Allen, one of the founders of Microsoft, and is managed by the aviation expert, Bret Rutan. "Every time a flight takes place as part of the project, we prove that the limits of commercial technology in space can be expanded with relatively modest amounts raised privately," said Allen.
The plane-like spacecraft will be launched into the air using a cargo plane called the "White Knight". It will stay in the upper atmosphere for about three and a half minutes, during which the pilot will experience weightlessness.
In the spacecraft's last test flight held in May, pilot Mike Melville reached an altitude of about 64 kilometers. It was the highest altitude reached by a non-governmental space program. The members of the project refer to the next planned flight as "an important step towards space flight for civilians".
The project competes within the framework of the "X Prize" fund, which will award a prize of ten million dollars to the first group that manages to fly a privately financed spaceship with three crew members to an altitude of one hundred kilometers and repeat the mission within two weeks. The organizers of the project announced that although the planned launch cannot currently compete within the framework of the fund, it has three seats and in the future it will compete with it. At least 26 other teams are competing for the prize, including teams funded by companies such as Amazon and Google.
"SpaceShipOne" does not look like a typical spacecraft. Its wings can move at an angle of 90 degrees in order to slow its entry into the lower atmospheres. Teisa will be able to see the black sky of space upon reaching peak altitude. The cost of building the spacecraft was 30 million dollars.
For news at the BBC
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