Spaceship Two

[Clunkclick]

http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2014/11/01/what-happened-to-virgin-galactics-spaceshiptwo/

 

Interesting.

 

Postscript

 

The VP Flight safety and a senior aerodynamicist left the organisation earler in the year.

 

And despite the catastrophic failure + fatality,  NSTB are allowing further test and development whilst the NSTB report is being compiled - Challenger and commercial pressures re-visited.

 

Ying tong piddle eye po 

 

 

Nick

Edited 2 November, 2014 by Clunkclick

[sparks03]

At least prices should come down now there's an alternative to the return ticket option.

[KenONeill]

I'm not speculating as to the cause, but I note that there has been a major change in SS2's fuel composition since the last flight.

[Gwilo]

Fuel tanks and rocket retrieved intact.....so not a fuel related explosion it appears.

Plot thickens........

[Aspman]

Big explody thing strapped to the back of a big plastic thing. Sometimes it's going to go wrong.

This morning's reports seem to say it wasn't the motor that went bang, something else broke.

 

Also a shuttle astronaut's comment was [paraphrasing] that it's an a awful lot of money for not much of a space flight.

[vindaloo]

Re-entry mechanism "the feathers" deployed early. As they also form the tailplane/stabiliser and got ripped off, it was a dead duck falling from the moment they detached.

[dazz600]

And the rich n famous are gonna pay £100k for a ride in that thing?

I did read Justin Bieber showed interest though.....

[ColinD]

Thing is 100k isn't that much to some people.

 

It's no more than a car and probably the daily supermarket dents don't matter driver.

 

Love all the hoopla about it being this or that. Amazing to think that because of one accident, people are doubting the program. Yet they fly, drive and get on boats... wow we really have got some way to go to regain our woolly mammoth hunting greatness.

 

Sad to see a live lost, but I reckon he was doing what he loved, and there will be more brave chaps to push the boundaries.

[KenONeill]

I'm not speculating as to the cause, but I note that there has been a major change in SS2's fuel composition since the last flight.

 

 

Fuel tanks and rocket retrieved intact.....so not a fuel related explosion it appears.

Plot thickens........

And that just goes to prove my point in not speculating.

[Gwilo]

And that just goes to prove my point in not speculating.

Didn't stop the armchair rocket scientists and ex-employees (disgruntled much?  :think: ) from getting their ten minutes of fame in the press.

Anything to kick Beardie when he's down.........jealousy is such an ugly trait.

[KenONeill]

Didn't stop the armchair rocket scientists and ex-employees (disgruntled much?  :think: ) from getting their ten minutes of fame in the press.

Anything to kick Beardie when he's down.........jealousy is such an ugly trait.

Very true; if you've got a copy of X-Planes (that's the inch thick coffee table book) there's an entire appendix devoted to the sort of issue that I was wondering about, but given the state of the fuel system when recovered it obviously wasn't.

[kilted]

Every experimental aerospace programme has its setbacks - this was a very public one.

 

Any time you want to push the envelope it takes a certain willingness (from designers, sponsors and pilots) to make mistakes and learn from them - how many pilots have lost their lives during the breaking of the sound barrier and how many astronauts were lost getting to space?

 

The shuttle was hailed by a lot of people as a success but it had numerous failures (some very public and a lot of minor ones) and was redesigned a number of times (one of the reasons it was shelved)

[KenONeill]

According to the crash investigators, they've got cockpit video confirming that the tail was deployed to the re-entry position too early.

[vindaloo]

According to the crash investigators, they've got cockpit video confirming that the tail was deployed to the re-entry position too early.

 

Initial statements by investigators.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-29876476

 

Branson comments on explosion speculation.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-29878994

 

J.