Victoria Principal is Future Virgin Galactic tourist!

Best known for her role as Pamela Ewing on the TV drama show "Dallas" from 1978 to 1987, Ms Victoria Principal will also be one of the future space tourists for Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic space tour service.

Now 61 years old, Victoria Principal is in training so that she can make the space trip. No date has been given yet as to when the first tourists will take flight.

In the article, the news about her being a future space tourist took second place to the news that she would not be a part of the big Dallas reboot to take place on TNT in the summer of 2012. The other actors of that series that will be reprising their roles. Larry Hagman as JR Ewing, Patrick Duffy as Bobby Ewing. Linda Grey will also be returning to the series as well.

The show will now focus on their children - now all grown up. Jessie Metcalfe will be playing Bobby and Pam Ewing's son Christopher.

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Ref.

1. Daily Mail. "As Dallas gets a reboot, original cast member Victoria Principal, 61 , proves that some classics really don't get old..." by Amelia Proud. December 26, 2011. (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2078562/Dallas-star-Victoria-Principal-61--looks-youthful-Malibu.html). images are from same article.

Paul Allen's new Stratolaunch Systems Endeavour

Billionaire Paul Allen and Burt Rutan announched a new venture for manned space travel. It will be the largest aircraft ever built based off of the carrier/space booster plan profile that the White Knight/SpaceShipOne was.

Broken down, you have the giant carrier aircraft which will built by Rutan's Scale Composites. The other part of the system is the multi-stage booster to be built by Elon Musk's SpaceX. The Mating and integration system that can handle up to 490,000 pounds will be built by Dynetics.

Quote: Stratolaunch Systems will bring airport-like operations to the launch of commercial and government payloads and, eventually, human missions. Plans call for a first flight within five years. The air-launch-to-orbit system will mean lower costs, greater safety, and more flexibility and responsiveness than is possible today with ground-based systems. Stratolaunch's quick turnaround between launches will enable new orbital missions as well as break the logjam of missions queued up for launch facilities and a chance at space. Rutan, who has joined Stratolaunch Systems as a board member, said he was thrilled to be back working with Allen. "Paul and I pioneered private space travel with SpaceShipOne, which led to Virgin Galactic's commercial suborbital SpaceShipTwo Program. end quote.

The new carrier aircraft if huge. It will have a wingspan of 380 feet which is longer than that of a football field. Quoting Burt Rutan: "You should never show this airplane, or a model of it, without right next to it, showing a plane that we know how big it is, like a little 747." end quote.

The carrier will have six turbofn engines - the type use of Boeing 747s. It will have a take-off weight of 1.2 million pounds and it will need a runway of 12,000 feet long to get off the ground. More than likely, it will have to take off from the Space Shuttle runway at the Kennedy Space Center.

Initially, Stratolaunch Systems will focus on cargo flights, but human flights quote: "will follow after safety, reliability, and operability are demonstrated."

First flight should take place before the end of the decade. Also, if you have problems viewing the video, just click on it to watch it on YouTube.

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Ref.

1. NSS Blog. "Stratolaunch Systems: New Space Launch System Announced by Paul Allen" December 13, 2011. (http://blog.nss.org/?p=3167).

2. cnet.com. "Paul Allen's Stratolaunch: Grand plan for next-gen space travel" by Daniel Terdiman. December 13, 2011. (http://news.cnet.com/8301-13772_3-57342415-52/paul-allens-stratolaunch-grand-plan-for-next-gen-space-travel/). image from article.

3. Stratolaunch website (http://www.stratolaunch.com/)

4. New Space Journal.com. "Paul Allen to unveil Stratolaunch Systems today" December 13, 2011. (http://www.newspacejournal.com/2011/12/13/paul-allen-to-unveil-stratolaunch-systems-today/).

VSS Enterprise Captive Flight Tests Begin

This blogger has been more distracted by the disaster of Obamacare and the effect it is having on this nation. However, I would be remissed in NOT observing a milestone in civilian spaceflight history.

Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo (aka VSS Enterprise), completed its first captive flight test on March 22nd, attached of course to its mothership, White Knight Two.

Reports say that it was a success and the flight returned to earth at Mojave Air and Spaceport without incident.

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ref. National Space Society Blog (http://blog.nss.org/?p=1767).

Burt Rutan - Manned Space Flight For the Future

Please check out my post about Burt Rutan on my other blog - The Shanks Dimension. And the recent email/letter he sent out. (http://www.theshanksdimension.com/2010/02/burt-rutan-recent-letter-to-the-new-media/). NOTE: Just in case you don't know who Burt Rutan is, he's the guy on the right standing next to Sir Richard Branson of Virgin Galactic. The mothership and VG's first passenger carrying spacecraft in the background.

Virgin Space Ship (VSS) ENTERPRISE!

Sir Richard Branson - founder of Virgin Galactic, and Burt Rutan, designer of SpaceShip 2 (SS2) revealed that ship to the public today.

This is a big milestone for Virgin Galactic's mission to be the first civilian commercial space line.

SS2 draws a great deal from its history from SpaceShip1(SS1) that had its first successful flight in 2004. SS1 won the famous Ansari X-Prize for completing the world's first manned private space flight. SS2 can carry 6 passengers and 2 pilot astronauts into sub-orbital flight.

The unvealing took place at the Mojave Air and Spaceport.

The flight profile will have SS2 attached to the White Knight 2 carrier craft nickname EVE after Sir Branson's mother. The WK2 will carry the SS2 up to 50,000 feet before it is dropped and fires off her rocket motors.

What I found special about this article is the news of what they intend to name this first spaceliner... Governors Schwarzenegger of California, and Governor Richardson of New Mexico, christened the SS2 as the Virgin Space Ship (VSS) ENTERPRISE. This is in line with the tradition of using the word Enterprise in the naming of Royal Navy, US Navy, NASA spacecraft - and of course of a certain science fiction tv series.

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Ref. Commercial space watch, December 7, 2009. (http://www.comspacewatch.com/news/viewpr.rss.html?pid=29757).

photo of Sir Branson and Burt Rutan December 7, 2009 (http://www.virgin.com/travel/inside-virgin-travel/virgin-galactic-unveils-spaceshiptwo-1/)

Commerical Spaceport America Groundbreaking Took Place Today

Ground breaking at the New Mexico commercial spaceport near the town of Truth or Consequences took place today. This is the $198 million dolar project, funded by the New Mexico state governement for commercial companies to have access to space. The facility will be known by the name of Spaceport America.

Gov. Bill Richards was in attendance. "After all of the hard work to get this project off the ground, it is gratifying to see Spaceport America finally become a reality."

Sir Richard Branson's space tourism company known as Virgin Galactic will be based at this location. Virgin Galactic will offer suborbital space flights costing $200,000 a ride. Virgin Galactic's President Will Whitehorn said that the company has taken in 300 advanced bookings. First planned spaceflights will began hopefully in two years.

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Ref. Reuters.com, "New Mexico breaks ground on commercial spaceport." by Tim Gaynor, June 19, 2009. ( http://www.reuters.com/article/scienceNews/idUSTRE55I5NK20090619).

Virgin's Space Tourism is Just the Beginning

Will Whitehorn has plans for the future with Virgin Galactic over the next 20 years.  Plans that include such things as space science, computer server farms and replacing long-haul flights. 

Virigin Galactic has collected $40 million in deposts from future space tourists including such notible people as physicist Stephen Hawking.  VG is planning to begin its commercial space trips within the next two years.  Mr. Whitehorn told reporters that they have bookings from over 300 people that are willing to pay $200,000 for each space flight.  

Right now, Virgin is still running test flights and is hoping to win a license form the Federal Aviation Administration.  "We needed to know we had a sound business plan," Will Whitehorn told FIPP World Magazine Congress, where he was invited to attend. 

Whitehorn also went into how "green" their business plan is by launching their spacecraft from a jet carrier aircraft over more conventional gorund-launch rocket technology.  Plus the non-metallic materials from which the SpaceShipTwo and its carrier aircraft are made from are lighter, and require less power than NASA's space shuttle.  

Virgin is not the only non-government party trying to get in on the space travel industry.  Such companies as SpaceX lead by Elon Musk, are developing their own space-launch vehicles.  some of which might one day be man-rated.  

But other plans for Virgin Galactic is also planning to add to their business plans for orbital computer server farms.  Long-haul transportation flights (i.e. London to Sydney in two and a half hours). Transporting crews up to the space station and launching satellites. 

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Ref. Reuters, London. by Georgina Prodhan posted May 7, 2009. (http://www.reuters.com/article/lifestyleMolt/idUSTRE54639Q20090507). 

White Knight Two Unveiled!

The twin fuselage four engine jet plane known as the White Knight Two was unveiled on July 28, 2008 at Scaled Composites. That facility is located in Mojave, California. Burt Rutan's Scaled Composites designed and built the Virgin Galactic's mothership, nicknamed “Eve” after Sir Richard Branson's mother. Eve Branson was also present for the debute of the large aircraft. Burt Rutan, the aircraft designer and is also still working on SpaceShipTwo. SpaceShipTwo is a larger version of the famous SpaceShipOne that tested the sub-orbital vehicle concept several years ago. SpaceShipTwo will be able to carry eleven people up into sub-orbit.
But the WhiteKnightTwo can also launch other spacecraft such as satellites, and other projects (manned and unmanned) in the future. SpaceShipTwo will ride between the twin fuselages of the mothership.
(ref. Space.com article by Leonard David posted on July 31, 2008).