Re: NASA IS SCREWED, thats a quote by rutan

From: Jon Berndt (jsb_at_at.hal-pc-dot.org)
Date: 10/04/04 

Date: Mon, 4 Oct 2004 16:59:13 -0500

"john doe" <jdoe@doe.org> wrote in message

> > nasa is screwed, thats a quote by rutan after todays flight, that quote
was
> > catrried on the news radio here today. things are changing, perhaps nasa
itself
> > is obsolete?
>
> Rutan's achievement is great. But it is really nowhere near having orbital
> capacity. Air France and British Airways, until recently , few Mach 2.5
with
> about 90 passengers for 3 hours flights twice a day. Rutan's machine
goes
> Mach 3 for a couple minutes for 2 pax and 1 pilot.
>
> I think they need to increase speed 10 fold before they can go to orbit,
and
> then deal with the heating problems of re-entry.

Energy >50X more per pound.

> It will be some time before NASA is made totally redundant for LEO travel.

I am a little perplexed by Rutan's vitriol directed at NASA. Is he striking
out at the engineers and all the people who make up NASA? The management?
The human spaceflight program? The bureuacracy? The idea? The inertia? And
if you look at nasawatch.com, there's the headline: "Civilian Space Travel
is Real - Get Used to it, NASA". What on earth is that? Is there some
aggravating competition going on here? I don't get it...

Jon

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