Wasn't anyone else just stunned by Bert Rutan's latest the other day:


The new space race is on

Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service

(KRT) - The following editorial appeared in the Chicago Tribune on
Tuesday, June 22:

X X X

Veteran test pilot Michael Melvill was at the helm Monday of
SpaceShipOne, a venture underwritten by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen.
Its journey from the Mojave Desert into the beyond and back was brief
(less than 90 minutes), expensive ($20 million) and barely reached the
inner boundary of space (62 miles).

But SpaceShipOne and Melvill proved that privately funded space travel
could be done. That may open the door to suborbital commercial flight,
just as Orville and Wilbur Wright opened the door to flight itself just
more than a century ago.


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This really is marvelous stuff.