SpaceShipOne Back, and Ready to go.
Although SpaceShipOne flight was a success there was a control problem that threatened the safety of the mission. Burt Rutan assures us that SpaceShipOne is back on Course"That's a complete, entire yes," Rutan said when asked whether his Scaled Composites team had gotten to the bottom of a trim-control problem experienced during SpaceShipOne's voyage to an altitude of 100 kilometers on June 21.
Rutan also clarified the issue of whether there will be passengers on the next flight. The X-Prize can be won by not actually flying passangers, but with an equivilent ballast.
Rutan said passengers won't fly on SpaceShipOne, at least at first.
"The only time we could do that is the second X Prize flight, because the earlier flight is an envelope-expansion flight" during which SpaceShipOne will fly with a heavier payload and employ a longer rocket burn than on earlier missions.
"Whether we fly passengers on the second flight we'll decide later, but there's no way we'll do that on the first flight," he said.
So, there is hope that there will be passengers on the second qualifying flight. One possibility is that passangers might be able to perform some sort of simple and short microgravity experiment.
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