Burt Rutan: On The Edge Of Space | Aero-News Network
Aero-News Network
RSS icon RSS feed
podcast icon MP3 podcast
Subscribe Aero-News e-mail Newsletter Subscribe

Airborne Unlimited -- Most Recent Daily Episodes

Episode Date

Airborne-Monday

Airborne-Tuesday

Airborne-Wednesday Airborne-Thursday

Airborne-Friday

Airborne On YouTube

Airborne-Unlimited-07.07.25

Airborne-NextGen-07.08.25

AirborneUnlimited-06.25.25

Airborne-AffordableFlyers-06.26.25

AirborneUnlimited-06.27.25

Wed, Sep 29, 2004

Burt Rutan: On The Edge Of Space

Rutan And Allen To Make First X-Prize Attempt Wednesday

When you ask Burt Rutan why he wants to go into space, you get a short history lesson on the shortcomings of NASA.

Rutan's SpaceShipOne is set to make the first of two X-Prize attempts Wednesday, flying to an altitude of 100 km (62 miles) twice in two weeks. It's a journey Rutan thinks should have happened long ago.

"By 1973, we had a space station, the Skylab, and we had multiple probes going up to planets. So, all this wonderful stuff happened in 10 to 15 years," he told the BBC. "About that time, there should have been enormous initiatives to make it affordable for people to fly in space, not just a handful of trained NASA astronauts and Russian cosmonauts. If you asked NASA in those days how long will it be until it is affordable so that I can fly, the answer would be, 'we're working on it and in 30 years there will be affordability.'"

Now, 31 years later, space has been largely restricted to that same elite group of astronauts and cosmonauts -- and China's first "taikonaut." But neither Burt nor the rest of us has yet to make it there. And these days, when you ask NASA how long it will take for space flight to become affordable to the average human, you get an eerily familiar answer: about 30 years.

"If it is 30 years, I will 90 and will a guy who is 90 get to fly?" he told the BBC.

For most of us, that would be the end of the discussion, but this is Rutan. "The first choice was to give up, and admit that I would never go into space, never see that black sky. The other choice I had was to do something about it," he said. Wednesday, his company will take another step toward that goal.

(ANN has a contingent of reporters at Mojave for Wednesday's SpaceShipOne launch. Stay tuned for live updates beginning Wednesday morning -- ed.)

FMI: www.scaled.com

Advertisement

More News

NTSB Prelim: Piper PA-23

Pilot Also Reported That Due To A Fuel Leak, The Auxiliary Fuel Tanks Were Not Used On June 4, 2025, at 13:41 eastern daylight time, a Piper PA-23, N2109P, was substantially damage>[...]

Classic Aero-TV: One Man’s Vietnam

From 2023 (YouTube Edition): Reflections on War’s Collective Lessons and Cyclical Nature The exigencies of war ought be colorblind. Inane social-constructs the likes of racis>[...]

NTSB Final Report: Capella Aircraft Corp FW1C50

Pilot Reported That He Was Unfamiliar With The Single Seat Amateur-Built Airplane And His Intent Was To Perform High-Speed Taxi Testing Analysis: The pilot reported that he was unf>[...]

Classic Aero-TV: Timber Tiger Touts Curtiss Jenny Replicas

From 2023 (YouTube Edition): First Kits to Ship October 2023 Having formerly resurrected the storied shape of the Ryan ST—in effigy, anyway—Montrose, Colorado-based Tim>[...]

ANN's Daily Aero-Term (07.04.25): Performance-Based Navigation (PBN) [ICAO]

Performance-Based Navigation (PBN) [ICAO] Area navigation based on performance requirements for aircraft operating along an ATS route, on an instrument approach procedure or in a d>[...]

blog comments powered by Disqus



Advertisement

Advertisement

Podcasts

Advertisement

© 2007 - 2025 Web Development & Design by Pauli Systems, LC