Spaceshiptwo has suffered a mid flight explosion...

[Data Holmes]

Foxnews has broken in with news just now that virgin galatic's spaceshiptwo has suffered a mid flight explosion after it ignited its rocket. One dead, one seriously injured.

Eta: http://gizmodo.com/virgin-galactic-experiences-first-major-accident-possi-1653360863

 

[Robert Maxwell]

Terrible news.

 

[Mary Ann]

A terrible loss for the pilot's family.

 

[Paul Weaver]

A terrible setback for space exploration

 

[B.J.]

Crap. Sad to hear about the pilot.

And this was the one they named Enterprise.

 

[sojourner]

A terrible setback for space exploration

Space tourism maybe. Not so much exploration.

 

[Paul Weaver]

A terrible setback for space exploration

Space tourism maybe. Not so much exploration.

Manned space exploration. Anything that increases the number of bodies in space is good. Down at the gold club:

* Hi guys, have you seen my shiny new supersonic jet?
* Well I've just been floating in space
* Well I'm off to an orbiting hotel next week
* I've just booked a week of golf on the moon
* I'm taking a sabbatical to take a trip to Mars

Never underestimate the one-upmanship that's possible.

A reliable sub-orbital industry also has practical uses, like high speed delivery of people and goods on earth. Mine in the Australian outback need a specialist and some parts from California? Costing $1 million an hour to keep is shut? You can save $10 million by chartering a point-to-point sub-orbital flight for $15 million.

 

[publiusr]

Some talk about a hard start

Branson and NTSB go-team en route:
http://aviationweek.com/commercial-space/spaceshiptwo-crashes-after-flight-anomaly
http://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/oct/31/spaceshiptwo-richard-branson-virgin-crash-mojave

Blurbs from the presser
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=35974.150

Some distancing
http://www.sncspace.com/press_more_info.php?id=417

It is already getting ugly:
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=35974.msg1280570#msg1280570

"Doug Messier of Parabolicarc.com tweeted that he has been interviewed by CBS, so look for a report from him on CBS."

He was on scene
http://www.parabolicarc.com/2014/10/31/spaceshiptwo-explodes-crashes-1-dead-1-injured/

It was rather like what happened to Formula driver Gilles Villeneuve back in '82 during a Formula event--I won't say any more than that.

 

[sojourner]

A terrible setback for space exploration

Space tourism maybe. Not so much exploration.

Manned space exploration. Anything that increases the number of bodies in space is good. Down at the gold club:

* Hi guys, have you seen my shiny new supersonic jet?
* Well I've just been floating in space
* Well I'm off to an orbiting hotel next week
* I've just booked a week of golf on the moon
* I'm taking a sabbatical to take a trip to Mars

Never underestimate the one-upmanship that's possible.

A reliable sub-orbital industry also has practical uses, like high speed delivery of people and goods on earth. Mine in the Australian outback need a specialist and some parts from California? Costing $1 million an hour to keep is shut? You can save $10 million by chartering a point-to-point sub-orbital flight for $15 million.

Which still makes it a terrible setback for tourism. Not exploration as such. My point stands.

 

[StarMan]

I'd imagine a few prospective "astronauts" might want a refund after this...

 

[Trekker4747]

A terrible setback for space exploration

The road between the first manned-rockets and the first landing on the moon is littered with explosions and deaths.

What we do with these accidents determines how much they're going to impact things and when undertaking dangerous and risky prospects some measure of death should be expected.

They weren't going to build a perfect rocket program and go from design, to prototype to active tourism without any accidents or loss of life.

Risk is part of the game if we're going to sit in that chair.

All sympathies and respects to the families of the victims but their sacrifices are on that same road that took us too the moon. A mistake to learn and adapt from so it doesn't happen again. This shouldn't be seen as a setback but a lesson we can learn from.

It's a sad day for these families but as a people looking to the stars and wanting to go to them we need to get right back up on that bike without batting an eye.

Let these men be not a footnote in history but right there in the first paragraph as men who were part of the pioneers in a new era of space-travel and man's destiny.

 

[Ensign_Redshirt]

I don't agree with the notion that some lives must be sacrificed to ensure that Justin Bieber can experience a couple of minutes of weightlessness.

SpaceShipTwo's significance for the history of spaceflight is way overblown in this thread IMO. And perhaps Richard Branson pushed just a little too hard to get his pet project finally running and it got someone killed in the process.

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

Or perhaps we don't have the full picture of what happened yet?

Playing the blame game at this juncture is pointless.

 

[HIjol]

A terrible setback for space exploration

The road between the first manned-rockets and the first landing on the moon is littered with explosions and deaths.

What we do with these accidents determines how much they're going to impact things and when undertaking dangerous and risky prospects some measure of death should be expected.

They weren't going to build a perfect rocket program and go from design, to prototype to active tourism without any accidents or loss of life.

Risk is part of the game if we're going to sit in that chair.

All sympathies and respects to the families of the victims but their sacrifices are on that same road that took us too the moon. A mistake to learn and adapt from so it doesn't happen again. This shouldn't be seen as a setback but a lesson we can learn from.

It's a sad day for these families but as a people looking to the stars and wanting to go to them we need to get right back up on that bike without batting an eye.

Let these men be not a footnote in history but right there in the first paragraph as men who were part of the pioneers in a new era of space-travel and man's destiny.

Well, well said, WalkerBait

All sympathies, indeed, but as you (and Kirk) said:

"Risk is part of the game if we're going to sit in that chair."

 

[Robert Maxwell]

Risk is one thing. Negligence is something else. There will be an investigation.

 

[HIjol]

Risk is one thing. Negligence is something else. There will be an investigation.

Truer words were never spoke.

 

[feek61]

perhaps Richard Branson pushed just a little too hard to get his pet project finally running and it got someone killed in the process.

Really? In July 2008 Branson predicted the maiden space voyage would take place within 18 months. In October 2009, Virgin Galactic announced that initial flights would take place from Spaceport America based on a "safety-driven schedule," which it hoped to achieve "within two years."

Since it's now 2014, that doesn't really seem like he is pushing too hard. It seems more like they are taking precautions and taking small steps in order to insure that it's safe. Yes, there was an accident and there will be an investigation but I hardly believe this happened because Branson "pushed just a little too hard."

 

[publiusr]

There probably was a little "go fever" here after all:
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=35117.msg1281378#msg1281378

"According to Parabolic Arc, a condition of that investment was that SS2 had to conduct an operational flight by the end of 2014. If they fail to achieve that goal, VG has to give back a major portion of the money." "Blackstar" is better known as Dwayne Day--of www.thespacereview.com
He and Launius are right up there with Oberg in terms of trust.


The guy at Parabolic Arc (Doug Messier) was on scene when all this happened. He has had a few things to say about VG--even before yesterday's tragedy:
http://www.parabolicarc.com/2014/10/30/apollo-ansari-hobbling-effects-giant-leaps/

WIRED weighs in:
http://www.wired.com/2014/10/virgin-galactic-boondoggle/?mbid=synd_slate

There were a few disqus comments from that WIRED article that made some sense, like the individual who calls himself "prime1987."

A lot of name calling otherwise--like this link I found in the fray:
http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2010/08/space-cadets.html
Neil deGrasse Tyson and Franklin Chang Diaz shows that more and more folks are pro-space.

Now I will say this--I think some of this is a backlash against folks like Simberg saying "safe is not an option."

Rand is hardly being classy himself: http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=35117.msg1281329#msg1281329
Cost-plus or no, Orion and Soyuz have abort systems. And NASA hasn't been as anti newspace as the other way around.

Something to think about:

There are two kinds of failures--good kinds and bad kinds.

Musk has had good failures. He pushed his unmanned grasshopper 'till it broke. He had an engine explode in Falcon, but still made it to ISS because he had engine out capability--and proved that the catastrophic loss of one motor need not result in fratricide among other closely packed engines. But he spread them out just the same. He didn't try to make something work--like sticking with a bad engine beyond all sense. One Dragon had thruster trouble--so he just hammered it home, and it worked.

In some ways Musk used a Soviet model in his company:

"Have a rocket bigger than you 'need:'"

"tough is better than beautiful."

Virgin's toy looked very pretty--but that is about it.

...Okay--we've talked about **good** failures--the one Musk has.
Then there are **bad** failures.

Was this a bad failure? Only time will tell.

Allow me to make a suggestion, for all it is worth.

Nix SS2.

Instead, join Dream Chaser as another user of Stratolaunch.

Kick hybrids and all composite construction to the curb.

Make a large suborbital plane with more paying seats and liquid fuels to be released under Stratolaunch.

The scaled down Dream Chaser gets released on a simpler solid to achieve orbit.
All Tiers accounted for.

Stratolaunch gets more reasons to fly, and less down time.

Rumor had it that the former Soviets had a second AN-225 in the works.
I might have paid for that to be based in the USA, (American owned) for both large suborbital spaceplanes, small MAKS orbital space planes--and would use it for cargo the other times so as to amortize costs.

A large top mount dedicated cargo plane of some find can service a lot of markets, more than underslung Stratolaunch perhaps...

That is the path that should have been followed from the start.

More news--this is a very fluid situation:
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-virgin-galactic-crash-ntsb-20141101-story.html
http://www.popularmechanics.com/sci...disaster-everything-you-need-to-know-17375882
http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2014/10/virgin-galactics-spaceshiptwo-fails-test-flight/

 

[JES]

I think that one of Q's quotes are good for this occasion:

"If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you ought to go back home and crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here. It's wondrous, with treasures to satiate desires, both subtle and gross. But it's not for the timid."

Now, I don't share Q's non-chalantance on the loss of life, which is tragic, and my thoughts and prayers go out to the friends and family of the two pilots, as well as the pilots themselves.

But space travel isn't easy, never has been. Hopefully, the loss of Spaceship Two will provide a valuable lesson, and Virgin Galactic will make any changes or improvements that they need to make, so this type of accident won't happen again.

Wasn't air travel also littered with accidents? I remember, I think the Comet, one of the earliest commercial jet, tearing itself apart, passengers, crew, and all, because the design of the squared windows compromised the integrity of the hull frame at high speeds, or something like that.

It is fortunate that at least this didn't happen on a publicized, commercial flight, like what happened with the Challenger, and I'm hoping this won't kill the idea of commercial spaceflight like last time.

These earlier spaceflight won't be like simply taking a seat on a commercial jet. The test pilots knew that when they strapped in and throttled up, they were taking a risk.
And spaceflight won't become any closer to becoming as safe as air travel, and the death of that one pilot will be in vain, if we give up now.

 

[sojourner]

Challenger was in no way, shape or form a "commercial flight". In fact, every shuttle flight was considered an experimental launch.