Burt Rutan: Building The People's Spaceship

Posted on: Nov. 28th, 2005 || Source: space.com | E-mail Article | Print Article

Stand by for dramatic and radical change in the emerging passenger space travel industry—but don’t count on NASA or major aerospace service providers to propel the public into space anytime soon.

Since the early 1970s, NASA seems to mean No Adult Supervision Apparent. The unaffordable space shuttle, for example, is a failure in trying to reduce cost for accessing Earth orbit. Moreover, companies out to build the space agency’s replacement for the shuttle — the Crew Exploration Vehicle — are doing so under an arrangement that cripples innovation, creativity, and the chance for breakthroughs.

Thus says Burt Rutan, the private airplane and spacecraft designer, who is anything but shy when it comes to telling the world where he thinks the United States – and NASA in particular, has gone wrong since the heyday of human spaceflight.

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