Posted on 10/11/2005 7:36:48 PM PDT by KevinDavis
Since well before SpaceShipOne captured the $10-million Ansari X Prize a year ago, the X Prize Foundation has been focusing much of its attention on its follow-on effort, the X Prize Cup. Modeled after the air races of the early 20th century, the Cup was intended to encourage X Prize teams not in running to win the prize itself to continue their efforts, helping promote a diversity of technical and operational approaches to passenger suborbital spaceflight. Such a competition, its backers hoped, would also provide a great deal of entertainment value for the public, bringing in sponsorship money and a higher profile in the media.
Those efforts got off to a modest start on Sunday in Las Cruces, New Mexico, with the Countdown to the X Prize Cup and Personal Spaceflight Expo. As the name suggests, this was not the competition promised for the full-fledged X Prize Cup—that will have to wait a few years—but instead an exhibition of the potential of the personal spaceflight industry. However, while the event was not competitive, the day was not without its winners, losers, and those who never got off the ground.
(Excerpt) Read more at thespacereview.com ...
Thanks for the PING.
Armadillo Aerospace (participant):
http://www.armadilloaerospace.com/n.x/Armadillo/Home
related; Robert Compton's kerosene and hydrogen peroxide motor tests, "Cheap Access to Space (CATS)":
http://www.ad6uy.com/sac-l5/motor-test.html
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