Looks like SpaceShipOne, the craft built by Paul Allen’s Mojave Aerospace Ventures, has won the Ansari X Prize for private space travel:
SpaceShipOne, the craft that breached the Earth’s atmosphere last week, won the $10 million Ansari X Prize for private space travel on Monday when it repeated its feat of reaching 100km.
Just after 8 a.m. PDT, CNN reported that SpaceShipOne reached an altitude of 368,000 feet–well above the 328,000 feet, or 100km, minimum altitude required to win the prize.
Totally cool if you ask me! Could space travel be commercialized as fast as air travel was in the 20th century? Surely it is following a similar pattern of events – many competitions for commercial air travel were held before it caught on. Personally though, I think space travel is incomplete without a moonbase 🙂
Read: CNET News.com
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