Beyond the Space Age

Design contest aims to revolutionize space travel

--Kimberly Chapple

Who knows what life on earth would be like if ordinary people had the ability to see it from a different perspective...to view the ecosystem from space and watch our 8,000-mile-diameter planet --with its one natural satellite, all 92 million miles from the sun--spinning through the stars amidst the infinite wonder of the universe.

Soon the ordinary may experience the extraordinary through the efforts of dozens of small teams around the world working to make privatized space travel a reality, says Designfax reader and Boeing technical fellow William G. Roeseler. Roeseler is a founding member of the Canyon Space Team, Seattle WA (www.canyonspaceteam.org), a soon-to-be-announced entrant in what's considered the first great aviation prize of the 21st Century: the X PRIZE New Race to Space. Designed to stimulate competition among the most talented entrepreneurs and design engineers in the world, the contest will produce a winner which "will permanently open the door for passenger travel into space and lead to the development of a new generation of low-cost, commercial spaceships," according to X PRIZE Foundation founder and chairman Peter Diamandis.

To win the $10 million prize, a team must privately build and fly a spaceship capable of carrying three adults to a suborbital altitude of 100 km (62 miles) on two consecutive flights within two weeks. Patterned after the Orteig Prize, won by Charles Lindbergh in 1927, the X PRIZE is headquartered in St. Louis (www.xprize.org), building on the historical significance of the Spirit of St. Louis. Achievements by the Wright Brothers and Paul MacCready were also inspired by prize competitions.

In Seattle, the Canyon Space Team will soon start building its first vehicles. "We've been testing our liquid-fueled rocket motors in the Washington wilderness for the past two summers and recently tested a 1/2-scale rocket-propelled ground vehicle," reports Roeseler. Two paths are being pursued: one is a 1/4-scale flying version of the vehicle and the other is an engine test vehicle for man-rating the rocket engine system. The two systems will be pursued on parallel paths. "Man-rating the propulsion system will be the most difficult aspect of this phase," notes Roeseler, "but with recent advances in materials technology, we know this can be done."

For more information, visit www.designfax.net. Our current online version includes a rendering of the preliminary design vehicle, the story This Is The Future of Technology by W.G. Roeseler detailing the birth and rationale of the Canyon Space Team and links to the organizations mentioned in this article. Circle 556.