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To the edge of space and back

A 63-year-old civilian pilot reaches 62 miles above Earth. Next: commercial space travel?

MOJAVE, Calif. - An ungainly-looking rocket plane punched through the Earth's atmosphere and then glided home to a desert landing Monday in history's first privately financed manned spaceflight - a voyage that could hasten the day when the final frontier is opened up to paying customers.

Pilot Mike Melvill took SpaceShipOne 62.2 miles above Earth, just a little more than 400 feet above the distance considered to be the boundary of space. The flight lasted just 90 minutes.

The spaceship - with its fat fuselage and spindly white wings - was carried aloft under the belly of a carrier jet. The jet then released the spaceship, and its rocket engine ignited, sending it hurtling toward space at nearly three times the speed of sound. It left a vertical white vapor trail in the brilliant blue sky.

SpaceShipOne touched down in the Mojave Desert at 8:15 a.m. to cheers and applause.

Melvill, 63, said seeing the curvature of the Earth was "almost a religious experience."

"It was really an awesome sight," he said. "It was like nothing I'd ever seen before, and it blew me away."

The flight is an important step toward winning the Ansari X Prize, a $10 million award for the first privately financed three-seat spacecraft to reach an altitude of 62 miles and repeat the feat within two weeks.

The three-seat requirement demonstrates the capacity for paying customers; the quick turnaround between flights demonstrates reusability and reliability.

Promoters hope that Monday's milestone and others will lead to a future where tourists will pay perhaps $20,000 to $100,000 for the opportunity to soar above the Earth's atmosphere, float in zero gravity and take in the sights.

"The door to space is finally open to the rest of us," said George Whitesides, executive director of the National Space Society, which is wants to see space travel opened to people from all walks of life.

He said the team members "have proven that human spaceflight is no longer the realm of governments alone."

By contrast, Alan Shepard soared to an altitude of 115 miles in 1961 when he became the first American in space. That flight lasted less than 151/2 minutes.

The SpaceShipOne project was funded by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, who said the project cost more than $20 million. "I had my heart in my throat when I watched the launch," Allen said.

Although the flight appeared to go flawlessly, SpaceShipOne designer Burt Rutan revealed afterward there was a serious malfunction when the craft's trim system failed, causing it to miss its atmospheric re-entry point by 22 miles. There was also a large bang during the flight, but SpaceShipOne's team did not know what caused that.

Hitting the target is important because once the plane re-enters the atmosphere, it becomes a glider and cannot simply fly to its destination. But Melvill said he had enough leeway built into the flight that he was able to return to Mojave Airport.

Word of Melvill's feat quickly reached the international space station 225 miles above Earth, where astronaut Mike Fincke declared, "Fantastic."

During his brief trip, Melvill opened a bag of M&M's and watched the candies, uninhibited by gravity, float through the cockpit. "It was absolutely amazing, these M&M's were just going around. It was so cool," he said.

For good luck the veteran pilot had attached a tiny horseshoe to his flight suit. He said the jewelry was something he had made and presented to his girlfriend when she was 16. She became his wife a year later.

Rutan gained wide fame by designing the lightweight Voyager aircraft, which flew around the world nonstop without refueling in 1986.

SPACESHIPONE: 62.2 miles

ALAN SHEPARD: 115 miles high in 1961 when he became the first American in space.

SPACE SHUTTLE: Various altitudes, from about 190 to 360 miles high.

INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION: Orbits 225 miles above Earth

In space, SpaceShipOne's twin tail booms and the back half of each wing rotate upward to create drag, much like feathers slow and stabilize a badminton shuttlecock. This allows deceleration to occur at a higher altitude and greatly reduces the heating of the craft. The tail booms and wings then return to normal for the glide to Earth.

LIKE A SUBMARINE: The cockpit is airtight. So, like a submarine, the structure must be able to withstand large forces caused by the difference in pressure. In this case, there is high pressure air inside compared to the near vacuum outside.

NO SPACE SUIT REQUIRED: You can think of the design of the cockpit with its dual seals and double window panes as essentially a space-worthy cockpit surrounded by a second outer shell. This redundancy eliminates the need for a space suit. Three components keep the cockpit comfortable. One, oxygen from a small bottle in the cabin is added at a small rate for breathing. Two, carbon dioxide from exhaled air is removed by using an absorber system. Third, the humidity is controlled by passing the air through another absorber material, keeping the cabin cool and dry.

WHERE'S THE DOOR? Pilots enter the small cockpit, 60 inches in diameter, through the nose of the ship. The wing span is 16.4 feet.

THE FUEL: When the pilot fired the craft's rocket, he ignited a fuel mixture of about 3,600 pounds of nitrous oxide - laughing gas - and rubber that sent the craft soaring straight up.

Burt Rutan of Scaled Composites says suborbital space travel for the public could become a reality within a few years. As the industry matures, tickets to space could cost $30,000 to $50,000 per person, he predicts. But ultimately, spaceflight will cost everyday citizens less than $12,000 in vehicles that could fly five or six passengers, he says.

Some companies, including several of Scaled Composites' neighbors at the Mojave Airport, are already taking reservations for public space flight.

Mojave-based XCOR Aerospace, for example, is offering advance tickets for suborbital flights for about $98,000.

With Monday's launch, the hardscrabble Mojave Airport also got a Federal Aviation Administration designation as the nation's first inland "Spaceport."

SCALED COMPOSITES: www.scaled.com

X-PRIZE: www.xprize.org

- Sources: Associated Press; Cox News Service; www.howstuffworks.com www.scaled.com

Pilot Mike Melvill, 63, has logged more than 6,400 hours of flight time in 111 airplanes and seven helicopters.

A native of South Africa, Melvill moved to the United States from England in the 1970s.

A longtime test pilot who serves as general manager of Scaled Composites, which designed the craft, he has set national and world records for altitude and speed and has flown everything from crop dusters to prototype jet fighters.

But Monday's trip to space may be the last for him for a while, he said.

"I think I'll back off a bit and ride my bike," Melvill said. "I'm just a guy. An old guy."

- Associated Press and Cox News Service