Virgin's SpaceShip2

Post by **LadyTevar** » 2006-10-05 11:29am

CNN Science wrote:A look inside Virgin Galactic's new ride

By Eric Adams
Popular Science

(PopSci.com) -- Virgin Galactic recently unveiled a mock-up of the slick, Philippe Starck --designed interior of its SpaceShipTwo (SS2) suborbital tourist vehicle.

The real bird won't be shown for at least a year, but at a press conference in New York, led by Richard Branson himself and Virgin Galactic chief Will Whitehorn, gave a good peek into how the program is progressing and what these first consumer spaceflights will be like.

The cabin itself is more than three times as large as that of the X Prize-winning SpaceShipOne (SS1), accommodating six passengers and two pilots and permitting plenty of float-around possibilities during the estimated five minutes of weightlessness the vehicle will achieve at the peak of its ascent.

Burt Rutan, designer of both vehicles and their motherships, White Knight and WhiteKnightTwo (WK2), and his team at Scaled Composites seem to be on track for the prototype unveiling late next year, although the stated 2009 commencement of commercial flights seems optimistic, given the apparent delays in the development of the scaled-up, more complex SS2.

Mockups of the cabin hints at Rutan's strategy -- make the spaceflight experience user-friendly for anyone other than hardcore test pilots.

In particular, he had to address the issue of the high-G climb out and the reentry, which was extraordinarily violent for the pilots on the three SS1 suborbital flights. SS2's cabin has ergonomic seats that automatically recline to orient the passengers' bodies to best absorb the G-forces.

They will be at a 60-degree upright angle for the ascent and then recline to a nearly horizontal attitude for the descent, with the passengers' legs comfortably bent in order to tolerate the high-G ride and the extreme buffeting that accompanies it.

Once back in the atmosphere, the seats will return to a 60-degree angle for the glide back to the spaceport.

The fully pressurized cabin will have 15 windows, including several on the floor and ceiling, permitting passengers to see Earth from multiple angles during their free-floating period. The view will be approximately 1,000 miles in any direction.

Large dials on the bulkhead will convey the mission time, speed of the spaceship, altitude and current G-forces being experienced. Passengers will wear lightweight, form-fitting pressure suits and helmets to ease movement around the cabin.

The overall flight profile, though extended, will mimic that of SS1. The enormous WK2 mothership -- which will be larger than a 757 and have a cabin identical to SS2, permitting the aircraft to be used as a training vehicle for the Virgin Galactic passengers -- will carry the 60-foot-long SS2 to 10 miles above sea level, about 50,000 feet, and release it.

SS2's hybrid motor will then ignite, accelerating passengers at four Gs to three times the speed of sound. For reentry, SS2's wings will pitch upward, "feathering" in a shuttlecock formation to automatically position the ship for the steep descent. At 70,000 feet, the wings will return to a horizontal glide formation for the runway landing.

Branson, in keeping with his recently announced commitment to environmental consciousness, extolled the spaceship's green qualities.

"It might be strange to think of a space vehicle as 'green,' " he said, "especially when you consider that the amount of energy released in a typical space shuttle launch could power New York City for a week. But we've created a fuel for SS2 that can launch eight people into space while expending the same amount of carbon dioxide as a single business-class seat on a New York-to-London flight."

The first SS2 will be called VSS Enterprise, and Virgin Galactic expects its first full fleet to comprise two motherships and five SS2s -- which would also permit the company to quickly expand its operations beyond the initial spaceport in New Mexico to other countries that permit the flights (the U.K. is high on its list).

Virgin is sticking by their ticket price of $200,000 and expects to offer lotteries and other means of democratizing the opportunity, including a reality-TV game show that is now under development.

Longer-term, Whitehorn says, the program is "about developing a methodology for spaceflight." He expects to use the SS2 technology for space and Earth-science studies, to expand to orbital flights, and to begin offering high-speed "spaceline" service going from, say, London to Sydney in less than an hour.

Lord Zentei · Post by **Lord Zentei** » 2006-10-05 03:28pm

Very cool; Branson gets my vote.

Now, with another zero or so knocked off the pricetag, I might actually be able to afford it someday. Here's hoping that this will continue to become more affordable.

Alan Bolte · Post by **Alan Bolte** » 2006-10-05 05:20pm

I'm begining to find the possibility of commercial space flight in my time very believable. I'm sure many businesses will find it worth the money to fly VIPs to the opposite side of the planet and back in the same day. Never mind what it could mean for cargo.

Alerik the Fortunate · Post by **Alerik the Fortunate** » 2006-10-06 03:09am

Does anyone find it curious that we are considering simultaneously the development of affordable private space travel and the demise of our civilization from the drying up of fossil fuels?

Post by **Broomstick** » 2006-10-06 04:41am

Personally? Not really - I'm been hearing doomsayers cry "The End is Near!!!" for the past 30 years. If it's not the end of oil it's nuclear holocaust or global famine or a pandemic or something.

All I'm willing to say about the future is that it will be different. I say that not because I'm an optimist or a pessimist but because I've seen an awful lot of certain predictions by experts of various sort prove to be largely false. Back in 1970, we were supposed to run out of oil by 1975, and the population was supposed to outstrip the food supply by the 1980's, leading to global nuclear warfare and massive death in the 1990's. Just didn't happen that way, did it? Doesn't mean the problems of oil supply, food production/distribution, international violence/aggression, and various other problems have gone away, just that they manifest differently than predicted. We were also supposed to get nearly all of our electricy from nuclear power, with electric "too cheap to meter" (I remember hearing that phrase A LOT), and that didn't happen, either.

So forgive me if I don't get my panties in a twist every time someone starts saying "WE'RE DOOMED! DOOMED!" We certainly do have some serious problems, the stakes are high, and history shows that it is possible for civilizations to come crashing down, but that doesn't mean it will happen over this, that, or the other "crisis". Civilizations have also weathered some pretty disruptive events, too.

So no, I don't find it ironic that we're looking into affordable civilian space travel during a period where fuel supply is looking ominous. If people don't have the optimism to keep pushing the boundaries they certainly are not going to have what it takes to come up with the innovations to solve problems. The amount of fuel consumed by annual spaceflights is dwarfed by the amount used by personal passenger vehicles - i.e. "the car". Even if everyone switched to small, fuel-efficient cars this would be true. (And folks lose sight of just how much fuel efficiency saves us - the car I currently drive gets three times as much distance from a given unit of fuel than the car I learned to drive on - imagine if that had not happened and our gasoline/petrol consumption was three times higher than it is now)

Faqa · Post by **Faqa** » 2006-10-06 08:18am

Does anyone find it curious that we are considering simultaneously the development of affordable private space travel and the demise of our civilization from the drying up of fossil fuels?

My own source of optimism is living in Israel. I figure oil shortages have to get in line behind Iran, Lebanon and Syria in order to kill me.

Not to mention Israeli drivers, which are worse than all the rest put together

As Broomstick says, humanity got here by pushing boundries. To get out of our current quandry, best we keep pushing them. Maybe they'll find magic fuel on the Moon or something. Probably not, but you get the idea.

Either way, this investment is unequivocally good. Anything that gets us to the stars faster is.

Post by **Coyote** » 2006-10-06 08:33am

Faqa wrote:Not to mention Israeli drivers, which are worse than all the rest put together

True, I always wondered why you guys wasted money on an Army. Any invading infantry won't make it past the first intersection.

As for Branson, good deal-- I doubt I'll get to ride on a spaceship anytime soon before I slip into geezerdom but knowing itis right around the corner is a good feeling. And as a counterpoint to what Broomstick said about doomsayers, there are also the over-optimistic types (like in Popular Science) who said we'd easily have Moon and Mars bases by 2000...

The tech for cheap spaceflight, Moon bases, fuel-sipping cars is there, we just lack the money and socio-political will to go for it.

Post by **K. A. Pital** » 2006-10-06 08:54am

The tech for cheap spaceflight, Moon bases, fuel-sipping cars is there, we just lack the money and socio-political will to go for it.

I thought we lack the latter, but NOT the former. There's plenty of money. But there's little sociopolitical will. Or, more like, political will. Because the socium surely would not object to having space bases. Rather, it will applaud and cheer.

Make great symbols of human pride, space advancements do.

salm · Post by **salm** » 2006-10-06 09:24am

If the price drops to 20 000€ i´ll get a ticket.

Post by **K. A. Pital** » 2006-10-06 09:30am

If the price drops to 20 000€ i´ll get a ticket.

I'll be tempted to take one, but I'll rather invest it all in scientific exploration of space. Boo my silly altriusm.

Post by **Broomstick** » 2006-10-06 07:36pm

paying for a ride WILL be an investment in space in general, including the science part, because anything that makes spaceflight routine and drive the cost-per-launch down will make it that much easier for science and exploration to occur.