Bubba goes to space....
Congragulations to Burt Rutan and the StarShipOne. These forward thinkers are not really Bubba's, but certainly they are first "regular" folks to fly to the official edge of space and for a total cost that probably is less than one of John Kerry's family homes.
The "mother ship" and the actual "space ship", StarShipOne, look like something out of a 1930's comic book or the drawings from a 12 year olds fantasy. In fact they looked a tad flimsy to be going to such heights and speeds particularly when compared to the massive proprortions we are used to in NASA vehicles. This made the attempt all the more exciting in my thinking. And, frankly, they made it look somewhat too easy, not withstanding that I realize that they've been working on this for years.
It was an historic event in aviation and truthfully one of my first thoughts was this. Here in the U.S. the government has been launching humans into space since the early 1960's and now we also have private citizens building spacecraft and leaving the planet. I wonder why the superior cultures of Europe have never put one, not one, person in space? While we are pushing the envelope of exploration, I wonder why the morally superior Imams and Potentates in the Middle East can't even provide most of their citizens with shoes or clean drinking water? Well no, I don't really wonder, I know. I hope they think about this too.
Congragulations to Burt Rutan and the StarShipOne. These forward thinkers are not really Bubba's, but certainly they are first "regular" folks to fly to the official edge of space and for a total cost that probably is less than one of John Kerry's family homes.
The "mother ship" and the actual "space ship", StarShipOne, look like something out of a 1930's comic book or the drawings from a 12 year olds fantasy. In fact they looked a tad flimsy to be going to such heights and speeds particularly when compared to the massive proprortions we are used to in NASA vehicles. This made the attempt all the more exciting in my thinking. And, frankly, they made it look somewhat too easy, not withstanding that I realize that they've been working on this for years.
It was an historic event in aviation and truthfully one of my first thoughts was this. Here in the U.S. the government has been launching humans into space since the early 1960's and now we also have private citizens building spacecraft and leaving the planet. I wonder why the superior cultures of Europe have never put one, not one, person in space? While we are pushing the envelope of exploration, I wonder why the morally superior Imams and Potentates in the Middle East can't even provide most of their citizens with shoes or clean drinking water? Well no, I don't really wonder, I know. I hope they think about this too.
