SpaceShipOne flight 15P
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Flight profile

All times are in PDT, which is seven hours behind UTC. This was the local civil time at the spaceport on the day of the flight. All measurements are first stated in the U.S. customary units
United States customary units
United States customary units are a system of measurements commonly used in the United States. Many U.S. units are virtually identical to their imperial counterparts, but the U.S. customary system developed from English units used in the British Empire before the system of imperial units was...

 in which they were originally reported, with conversions to SI
Si
Si, si, or SI may refer to :- Measurement, mathematics and science :* International System of Units , the modern international standard version of the metric system...

 units also given.

Taxiing for takeoff from Mojave Spaceport was originally planned for 06:30, because the wind conditions in that area are most favourable in the early morning. Taxiing actually started at 06:37, and the flight took off at 06:47. After an ascent to 47,000 feet (14.3 km) coupled with the White Knight airplane, the SpaceShipOne craft separated at 07:50 and immediately ignited its rocket
Rocket
A rocket is a missile, spacecraft, aircraft or other vehicle which obtains thrust from a rocket engine. In all rockets, the exhaust is formed entirely from propellants carried within the rocket before use. Rocket engines work by action and reaction...

.

Shortly after ignition, at about 60,000 feet (18 km), the craft unexpectedly rolled
Flight dynamics
Flight dynamics is the science of air vehicle orientation and control in three dimensions. The three critical flight dynamics parameters are the angles of rotation in three dimensions about the vehicle's center of mass, known as pitch, roll and yaw .Aerospace engineers develop control systems for...

 90 degrees to the left, due to wind shear. When the pilot attempted to correct it, it rolled 90 degrees to the right. The pilot levelled the craft out, and proceeded with the climb. The correction of the roll excursion, using full trim, caused a pitch trim tab to run up against a stop. This caused the trim actuator, as designed, to stop operating for a 3 s timeout. Not realising what had happened, the pilot and controllers interpreted this as failure of the trim actuator, and they switched to a backup system. Spacecraft attitude was problematic during the entire climb, and not corrected until the start of re-entry.

During the burn, a new aerodynamic fairing installed around the rocket nozzle overheated, became too soft, and crumpled inwards. This caused a loud bang, which the pilot reported, but did not cause a flight problem.

The rocket burn lasted for 76 seconds. At burn-out the altitude was 180,000 feet (54.9 km), the Mach number
Mach number
Mach number is the speed of an object moving through air, or any other fluid substance, divided by the speed of sound as it is in that substance for its particular physical conditions, including those of temperature and pressure...

 was 2.9, and the speed was 2150 mph (3460 km/h; 961 m/s).

The planned apogee altitude was 360,000 feet (110 km), but due to the attitude problem encountered during the climb the craft actually attained only 328,491 feet (100,124 m). In doing so it passed the boundary to space at 100 km, making the flight, as planned, officially a spaceflight
Spaceflight
Spaceflight is the act of travelling into or through outer space. Spaceflight can occur with spacecraft which may, or may not, have humans on board. Examples of human spaceflight include the Russian Soyuz program, the U.S. Space shuttle program, as well as the ongoing International Space Station...

. It can be calculated that the altitude exceeded 100 km for approximately 10.23 s.

Around apogee the craft experienced about 3 minutes of weightlessness
Weightlessness
Weightlessness is the condition that exists for an object or person when they experience little or no acceleration except the acceleration that defines their inertial trajectory, or the trajectory of pure free-fall...

. Pilot Mike Melvill
Mike Melvill
Michael Winston "Mike" Melvill is one of the test pilots for SpaceShipOne, the experimental spaceplane developed by Scaled Composites. Melvill piloted SpaceShipOne on its first flight past the edge of space, flight 15P on June 21, 2004, thus becoming the first commercial astronaut and the 434th...

 opened a bag of M&M's
M&M's
M&M's are dragée-like "colorful button-shaped candies" produced by Mars, Incorporated...

 and watched them float around the capsule in free-fall.

The craft re-entered the atmosphere 22 miles (35 km) south
South
South is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating direction or geography.South is one of the four cardinal directions or compass points. It is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to east and west.By convention, the bottom side of a map is south....

 of its planned 5 by 5 mile (8 by 8 km) re-entry zone. The pilot finally corrected the spacecraft attitude at this point, using a backup trim system. The craft reached Mach 2.9 and experienced deceleration of 5.0 g
G-force
The g-force associated with an object is its acceleration relative to free-fall. This acceleration experienced by an object is due to the vector sum of non-gravitational forces acting on an object free to move. The accelerations that are not produced by gravity are termed proper accelerations, and...

 (49 m/s²) during descent. The craft switched to gliding configuration at an altitude of 57,000 feet (17.4 km), then returned to the spaceport and landed safely at 08:14.

Spectacle

Scaled Composites
Scaled Composites
Scaled Composites is an aerospace company founded by Burt Rutan and currently owned by Northrop Grumman that is located at the Mojave Spaceport, Mojave, California, United States...

, the makers of SpaceShipOne, announced the planned spaceflight on June 2, 2004, and invited the public to watch. An estimated 11,000 people went to Mojave Spaceport to watch the flight, and millions more watched on television. Distinguished attendees included former astronaut Buzz Aldrin
Buzz Aldrin
Buzz Aldrin is an American mechanical engineer, retired United States Air Force pilot and astronaut who was the Lunar Module pilot on Apollo 11, the first manned lunar landing in history...

 and the Commanding Officer
Commanding officer
The commanding officer is the officer in command of a military unit. Typically, the commanding officer has ultimate authority over the unit, and is usually given wide latitude to run the unit as he sees fit, within the bounds of military law...

 of Edwards Air Force Base
Edwards Air Force Base
Edwards Air Force Base is a United States Air Force base located on the border of Kern County, Los Angeles County, and San Bernardino County, California, in the Antelope Valley. It is southwest of the central business district of North Edwards, California and due east of Rosamond.It is named in...

.

Because SpaceShipOne launches to the east
East
East is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating direction or geography.East is one of the four cardinal directions or compass points. It is the opposite of west and is perpendicular to north and south.By convention, the right side of a map is east....

 of Mojave Spaceport early in the morning, the crowd at the spaceport found themselves looking into the sun
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields...

 when watching the aircraft. Nevertheless, the crowd was exuberant, cheering every milestone in the flight, including the double sonic boom following the thrust phase. After SpaceShipOne landed, White Knight and the chase planes made celebratory passes over the runway. Mike Melvill displayed great excitement, waving to the crowd while standing on top of SpaceShipOne. He also held up a sign reading "SpaceShipOne, GovernmentZero," given to him by a spectator. Melvill was greeted by Buzz Aldrin
Buzz Aldrin
Buzz Aldrin is an American mechanical engineer, retired United States Air Force pilot and astronaut who was the Lunar Module pilot on Apollo 11, the first manned lunar landing in history...

, the second person to have walked on the Moon
Moon
The Moon is Earth's only known natural satellite,There are a number of near-Earth asteroids including 3753 Cruithne that are co-orbital with Earth: their orbits bring them close to Earth for periods of time but then alter in the long term . These are quasi-satellites and not true moons. For more...

.

Reactions

NASA
NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research...

 administrator Sean O'Keefe
Sean O'Keefe
Sean O'Keefe is the CEO of EADS North America, a subsidiary of the European aerospace firm EADS, a former Administrator of NASA, and former chancellor of Louisiana State University . O'Keefe is also a former member of the board of directors of DuPont...

 issued a statement about the flight, saying:
We applaud the remarkable achievement of Burt Rutan
Burt Rutan
Elbert Leander "Burt" Rutan is an American aerospace engineer noted for his originality in designing light, strong, unusual-looking, energy-efficient aircraft...

, Paul Allen
Paul Allen
Paul Gardner Allen is an American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist. Allen co-founded Microsoft with Bill Gates...

 and test pilot Mike Melvill
Mike Melvill
Michael Winston "Mike" Melvill is one of the test pilots for SpaceShipOne, the experimental spaceplane developed by Scaled Composites. Melvill piloted SpaceShipOne on its first flight past the edge of space, flight 15P on June 21, 2004, thus becoming the first commercial astronaut and the 434th...

 following the first successful suborbital flight of SpaceShipOne. Not unlike the first U.S. and Soviet space travelers in 1961, and China's first successful spaceflight
Shenzhou 5
Shenzhou 5  — was the first human spaceflight mission of the People's Republic of China , launched on October 15, 2003. The Shenzhou spacecraft was launched on a Long March 2F launch vehicle. There had been four previous flights of unmanned Shenzhou missions since 1999...

 last October, these private citizens are pioneers in their own right. They are doing much to open the door to a new marketplace offering the experience of weightlessness
Weightlessness
Weightlessness is the condition that exists for an object or person when they experience little or no acceleration except the acceleration that defines their inertial trajectory, or the trajectory of pure free-fall...

 and suborbital space flight to the public. We congratulate the SpaceShipOne team and wish all those who may follow safe flights.


The X Prize Foundation
X Prize Foundation
The X PRIZE Foundation is a non-profit organization that designs and manages public competitions intended to encourage technological development that could benefit mankind....

 issued a press release about the flight:
We congratulate the entire Scaled Composites' team, in particular Burt Rutan and Mike Melvill for achieving this tremendous milestone. We also thank Paul Allen for his willingness to help open this critical, but risky frontier. The entire X PRIZE organization looks forward to receiving Scaled Composites' 60-day notice indicating they are ready to make their attempt to win the $10 million purse. Once such notice is received, we will make the information publicly available.


The Federal Aviation Administration
Federal Aviation Administration
The Federal Aviation Administration is the national aviation authority of the United States. An agency of the United States Department of Transportation, it has authority to regulate and oversee all aspects of civil aviation in the U.S...

 presented Melvill with astronaut wings
Astronaut Badge
The Astronaut Badge is a badge of the United States, awarded to military and civilian pilots who have completed training and performed a successful spaceflight...

 in a ceremony at 10:22, two hours after landing.

Relation to the Ansari X Prize

As intended, the flight exceeded the 100 km threshold required for the X PRIZE. However, the flight was not intended as an X PRIZE competitive flight, and was not registered as such.

The flight did not carry any passengers, or equivalent ballast, as required for an X PRIZE flight, and so could not qualify as a competitive flight. Furthermore, the X PRIZE rules require a repeat flight within two weeks, which the Scaled Composites
Scaled Composites
Scaled Composites is an aerospace company founded by Burt Rutan and currently owned by Northrop Grumman that is located at the Mojave Spaceport, Mojave, California, United States...

 team had no intention of making.

Flight 15P was intended to be the final test flight before making the two X PRIZE flights later in 2004. Due to the problems encountered on this flight it was thought that an additional test flight might be needed. However, by July 7, 2004 Burt Rutan
Burt Rutan
Elbert Leander "Burt" Rutan is an American aerospace engineer noted for his originality in designing light, strong, unusual-looking, energy-efficient aircraft...

 reported that the faults had been resolved and the next flights
SpaceShipOne flight 16P
Flight 16P of SpaceShipOne was a spaceflight in the Tier One program that took place on September 29, 2004. It was the first competitive flight in the Ansari X PRIZE competition to demonstrate a non-governmental reusable manned spacecraft, and is hence also referred to as the X1 flight...

 would be competitive.

External links

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