Commercial Astronaut Says Sim Complete, Design Underway

As the world's first commercial astronaut prepares to take his space vessel and its mothership on an unprecedented cross-country flight to Oshkosh, WI, for AirVenture 2005, Mike Melvill and Scaled Composites are working hard to develop a second generation commercial space vehicle.

"We are working hard in that direction," Melvill told ANN during an EAA conference call last week. "We already have a simulator set up. In the simulator, SpaceShipTwo already flies better than SpaceShipOne did."

One of the keys to that better performance is better control separation for each axis of flight -- pitch, yaw, roll, Melvill said.

"SpaceShipOne was a little tricky to fly. The new design that Burt's got on the drawing board seems a much benign, easier-to-fly airplane."

That would probably come as something of a relief to Melvill. During his first X-Prize attempt, Melvill's series of 29 unplanned rolls while in near-vertical flight caused the world to hold its breath. The rolls were much more dramatic than they seemed -- there was virtually no undue stress on the spacecraft, according to Melvill.

"The design [of SpaceShipTwo] has obviously grown from [the design of SpaceShipOne] into a better aerodynamic design," Melvill said.

Melvill didn't say when there would be more news on SpaceShipTwo, but told us (as we often tell you)... stay tuned.

FMI: www.scaled.com