St. Louis Science Center Site For Award Ceremony And Rally

Think of what you could do with $10 Million bucks...

The $10 million ANSARI X PRIZE will be awarded to Scaled Composites, LLC, creators of SpaceShipOne, during a special ceremony and public rally Sat., Nov. 6, 2004, 10-11:30 am, at St. Louis University High School's athletic field next to the St. Louis Science Center, 5050 Oakland Ave., St. Louis, MO. Burt Rutan, Scaled Composite's team leader, will accept the check from Peter Diamandis, MD, chairman of the X PRIZE Foundation.

Visitors should begin arriving at 9:30 am for a rally to greet the Scaled Composites'
team. The entire team, from engineers and builders to the pilots, will attend.
Check presentation ceremony is 10:30 am followed by a full day of activities at the Science Center. From approximately 11 am-3:30 pm visitors can meet the Scaled Composites team, including Burt Rutan and pilots Brian Binnie and Mike Melville, get their autographs, and take photos.

In addition to meeting the team members at the Science Center, visitors can participate in numerous hands-on activities related to space flight, sign a giant congratulations banner for the Scaled Composites team, see demonstrations of rocket launches, and take your photo alongside an image of SpaceShipOne.

Paul Allen, chairman of Charter Communications and co-founder of Microsoft, will attend the ceremonies along with Sir Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group. Allen partnered with Rutan to form Mojave Aerospace Ventures to fund the Scaled Composites team. Branson's Virgin Galactic will sell sub-orbital space rides for about $200,000 per person utilizing SpaceShipOne's technology. Branson has pledged to reinvest any profits from Virgin Galactic into developing other space tourism business.

In order to win the $10 million ANSARI X PRIZE, SpaceShipOne successfully completed two manned flights, to a minimum of 100km (62.5 miles), into space within a 14 day time period. SpaceShipOne completed the first flight Wed., Sept. 29, and the second flight Mon., Oct. 4 to capture the prize.

The ANSARI X PRIZE was founded by the New Spirit of St. Louis members who created the prize to further commercial space endeavors. The Ansari family is the title sponsor of the prize. Sponsors of the weekend ceremonies include: St. Louis Science Center, X PRIZE Foundation, Champ Car World Series, 7-Up, M&Ms Chocolate Candies, Enterprise Financial Services Corporation, and Regional Chamber and Growth Association (RCGA). Media partners are St. Louis Post-Dispatch and St. Louis Commerce Magazine.

ANN's Jim Campbell will be the X Prize Photographer on site, and will be filing a story from the event ASAP.

FMI: www.xprize.org