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A team from Scaled Composites, Boeing and the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) was expected to attempt a drop test of the X-37 approach and landing test vehicle (ALTV) reusable spaceplane over the Edwards AFB test range in California around 1 April. The X-37 technology demonstrator, which was transferred from NASA to DARPA in September 2004, was originally part of a planned series of reusable space plane demonstrators known as Future X, which was aimed at developing technology for a Space Shuttle replacement.

Lots of hard work. Big burst of publicity. Lots of hard work. That's been the pattern for Burt Rutan. He is the model of persistent performance, averaging more than one new aircraft design per year for over 30 years. Then, last October 4, Rutan and his team at Scaled Composites grabbed the world's attention. They became the first private operation to send a man into suborbital space twice within two weeks, using the same vehicle. Rutan and company nabbed the $10 million Ansari X-Prize, and proved that entrepreneurial creativity could extend beyond the Earth's atmosphere. Now it'll take more hard...

I know this is early, but heck I'm excited.

Flying the first commercial test pilot into space three months ago was more than a feat of entrepreneurial engineering. SpaceShipOne's maiden flight just beyond the edge of the atmosphere also required a little bureaucratic ingenuity from Patricia Grace Smith and her staff at the Federal Aviation Administration. The privately financed rocket plane, which makes its second scheduled test flight to space Wednesday, flies under the regulatory wing of Smith's Office of Commercial Space Transportation. Since 1984, the office has been in charge of licensing dozens of U.S. commercial space launches. Until recently, all those launches involved the kind of expendable,...

Flight data from the first private vehicle to soar beyond the Earth's atmosphere has been posted by Scaled Composites, designer and builder of the SpaceShipOne. The flight was not trouble-free. With 63-year-old pilot Mike Melvill at the controls, SpaceShipOne's fourth powered flight on June 21 sliced through the sky high over Mojave, California desert. It was the first commercial astronaut flight by exceeding 328,000 feet (100 kilometers) -- to the edge of space. The flight marked the first time an aerospace program had successfully completed a piloted mission without government sponsorship. Momentum carried the day On the June 21 flight...

The race to get an astronaut and privately-owned rocket into space is hotting up. The Ansari X-prize will give $10m to the first team who can get a spaceship able to carry three people into space - defined as 100km above earth. They must return safely and repeat the feat within two weeks. Last month Mike Melvill was the first mere mortal in space aboard SpaceShipOne and it looked like the prize was his. But problems meant they were unable to go up again within the two weeks specified by the prize. And now there's someone on their tail.

The boundary between the old and the new is usually a little blurred; there is often a period of overlap coloring the transition. The start of the jet age would be such an example in the aerospace business, with both Spitfires and Meteors flying in the same skies. Nevertheless, there are sometimes identifiable events in history when even an observer at the time can see that a massive change has taken place, and that one era is closing and a new one has begun. Monday June 21st, in Mojave, California was one such turning point. We have entered a new...

Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2004 June 25 Planet Earth from SpaceShipOne Credit: Scaled Composites Explanation: On June 21st, pilot Mike Melvill made a historic flight in the winged craft dubbed SpaceShipOne -- the first private manned mission to space. The spaceship reached an altitude of just over 62 miles (100 kilometers) on a suborbital trajectory, similar to the early space flights in NASA's Mercury Program. So, how was the view? A video...

A milestone in the birth of a new kind of space age IT IS early in the morning in Mojave, and a pink blush has appeared on the horizon. One by one the stars are fading, and to the south of the airport a line of car headlights snakes into the distance. There is, however, no chance of hearing birdsong during what would otherwise be a serene desert dawn, for rock music is pumping out of huge speakers along the runway. Welcome to the age of commercial spaceflight. Prepare your chequebook for take-off. On June 21st, Mike Melvill fired his...

MOJAVE, CALIFORNIA -- There were tense times during the sky-blistering flight of SpaceShipOne here this morning. Fighting control problems, pilot Mike Melvill wrestled with several anomalies that cut short a pre-planned altitude mark.

I thought this will be the official live thread of the historic launch of Spaceship One. Since this will happen while I'm at work, I thought I give a live thread an eary start..

Private spaceships need private money. It’s no different for the design, building and testing of SpaceShipOne, now undergoing final checks for a public shakeout Monday over the Mojave Desert in California.

MOJAVE, Calif. -- The skies above this high-desert town have seen a lot of history.

A privately built rocket plane is ready to streak through the sky over Mojave, California desert on June 21. Project officials herald it as the first non-governmental piloted flight to leave the Earth's atmosphere.

All spaceflight is risky, any expert will tell you. Maiden voyages can be particularly tricky, given all the unknowns. Even SpaceShipOne, a smooth-operating, trusty craft, had a mishap upon landing during a test flight last December.

XCOR Aerospace announced today that it has been informed by the Federal Aviation Administration's Associate Administrator for Commercial Space Transportation (AST) that its application for a commercial space launch license has been deemed "sufficiently complete." This significant regulatory milestone means that AST has committed itself either to issue a launch license to XCOR within 180 days or notify Congress that it failed to do so. "We still have work to do, but this a major step toward being issued a launch license," said XCOR's Randall Clague. "It shows that the process AST has put in place is achievable even for...

Burt Builds Your Ride to Space Burt Rutan wants to fly into space every Tuesday for five months, to test a concept and prove a point. And he wants to do it soon: He may make the first flight before the December 17 Wright brothers centenary. Chances are, he'll succeed. That was the buzz in Mojave, California, when Rutan, one of the world's most innovative aircraft designers, recently unveiled what could become the first successful privately funded manned space program, a system composed of two startlingly original vehicles: the insect-like White Knight mother ship, and SpaceShipOne, a winged, rocket-propelled pod...