Jun 21 2004
From The Space Library
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(New page: The company Scaled Composites launched the first privately developed piloted vehicle to travel beyond Earth's atmosphere. The vehicle, called SpaceShipOne, departed from Mojave Air...)
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The company Scaled Composites launched the first privately developed piloted vehicle to travel beyond Earth's atmosphere. The vehicle, called SpaceShipOne, departed from Mojave Airport in California at 6:45 a.m. Pacific Standard Time (PST), attached to another aircraft. Upon reaching an altitude of 46,000 feet (8.7 miles or 14 kilometers), the aircraft released SpaceShipOne. Propelled by a fuel containing rubber and nitrous oxide ~ laughing gas ~ SpaceShipOne eventually attained an altitude of 328,491 feet (62 miles or 100 kilometers), achieving suborbital spaceflight. After SpaceShipOne had remained in suborbital flight for nearly 31/2 minutes, the vehicle's pilot Michael W. Melvill ~ who became the first civilian astronaut with this flight ~ safely landed the craft at Mojave Airport. [[Burt Rutan]], the founder of Scaled Composites, had designed SpaceShipOne, and Microsoft cofounder Paul G. Allen had financed the project. (Peter Pae, “Private Spaceflight Is a Public Success,” Los Angeles Times, 22 June 2004; Scaled Composites, “SpaceShipOne Makes History: First Private Manned Mission to Space,” news release, 21 June 2004.
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