Silly names aside (White Knight? SpaceShipOne?), this has gotta be better at sparking imaginations than movies, books, and comics for kids (and adults, alike). But really, who hasn't wanted to fly into space, even if only for a little while? (Alright, admittedly, some don't because there usually is a distinct risk of blowing up, but still...)

How long before an "average" person could take a space flight? Well, there's hardly even been possibly for an "average" person to take a supersonic flight (at it's cheapest of about $4k, it was hardly available to the "average"). I'd guess at decades, still. And let's not even bother about talking about space station resorts and moon resorts. Even if they would happen in our lifetimes at a mere $20k/night, the waiting list would be so long you'd die first anyway. But who knows, the cost of sending someone to space (even if for 3 minutes) was actually fairly small, on an investment scale: I've heard it was around $20million or so. We all saw plenty of companies blow far more than that during the "boom" period with far less getting done. Perhaps this is door opening, industry creating news?

SpaceShipOne Makes History with First Manned Private Spaceflight

Posted by Shane on June 21, 2004 9:05 AM | Permalink