Branson's Pickle

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youtube.com/watch?v=3KI2_cpR9Ek&

Looking forward to watching the Virgin galactic launch today .   It should be interesting .

I hope everything goes ok .

I do have the following observations to make though Richard if your reading this (whilst emptying your bowels ready for launch).

Bad company name.  

Virgin Galactic -In what way are you galactic (aside from wealth) ? your not even reaching space.

Bad vehicle  name = Space ship 2 - your never getting into officially recognised space with your plane ? 80 Km dude, that's not space .

I suggest "Virgin Highplane"

and the vehicle "high plane 2"

Mind you that probably wouldn't have inspired many investors.

Good luck though 

AP

Post edited at 12:32
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 broken spectre 11 Jul 2021
In reply to Archmagos_Dominus:

What is it with billionaires and their desire to escape the Earth?

Also. Good thread title, it's the best I've seen and I've seen a few 👍

 mcdougal 11 Jul 2021
In reply to broken spectre:

> What is it with billionaires and their desire to escape the Earth?

Jumping before they're pushed? 

 broken spectre 11 Jul 2021
In reply to mcdougal:

I'm reminded of Zaphod Beeblebrox buggering off in the Heart of Gold. I'll still watch the 'launch' though. Cheers Astro 👍

 broken spectre 11 Jul 2021
In reply to Archmagos_Dominus:

I bet he's shitting himslef lol

In reply to broken spectre:

> I bet he's shitting himslef lol

You'd be mad not to .

It's a long way up space or not.  

😃

 wintertree 11 Jul 2021
In reply to Archmagos_Dominus:

Watching Bezos and Brandon wind each other up over second place in the “new space race” is pretty sad really.

The contrast to a possible orbital launch of Starship this month is quite big.

 jimtitt 11 Jul 2021
In reply to Archmagos_Dominus:

Did it though!

 Rob Parsons 11 Jul 2021
In reply to Archmagos_Dominus:

This whole thing is a gimmicky joyride - as is the related sub-orbital Blue Origin effort - but still, I'd like to go for a ride, if I could afford it.

My question is whether or not these things are actually viable businesses. How do the economics stack up? How many people can afford the ticket prices?

Edit: I notice that all passengers  seemed to be wearing parachutes, (but not helmets.) I wonder where any bailouts might be planned?

Post edited at 17:16
 Timmd 11 Jul 2021
In reply to Rob Parsons:

Is it environmentally sustainable, too.

1
 Rob Parsons 11 Jul 2021
In reply to Timmd:

> Is it environmentally sustainable, too.


It's obviously an environmental nonsense.

 sbc23 11 Jul 2021
In reply to Archmagos_Dominus:

It’s a bit pathetic compared to Spacex.

The media doesn’t seem to have noticed that Spacex has been flying passengers to orbit and the ISS for the past two years and recently on dirty, soot-covered reused boosters to NASA standards. That’s 25,000km/h and 400km high, resident for 6 months.

Virgin has ‘won’ the race to 2,000km/h, 100km high for 4 minutes. The X-15 did that over 60 years ago.

In reply to sbc23:

Ahem. 80km. Virgin' on not quite space.

 wintertree 11 Jul 2021
In reply to sbc23:

> Virgin has ‘won’ the race to 2,000km/h, 100km high for 4 minutes. The X-15 did that over 60 years ago.

To be fair, the X-15 didn’t have passengers; Virgin are the first to fly passengers (paying ones at that soon enough) in this flight regime ever, and they’re only the third people to fly a manned aircraft in it after the X-15 and SpaceShipOne.  It’s a genuine expansion of the envelop of what has been done, unlike Blue Origin…

Arguably it’s not a very important expansion of the envelope…

In reply to wintertree:

Not to mention Inspiration4, which will be the first 'real' space tourism of the truly frivolous folly kind that's independent of any government asset and will actually be properly in space. Bezos and Branson are toddlers on a trampoline in this game.

 wintertree 11 Jul 2021
In reply to Longsufferingropeholder:

Axiom Space are shifting in to a high gear as well.

Watching SNC with interest over inflatable habs now that the Transhab patents Bigelow had have expired and Bigelow Aerospace have packed it in.  If you haven’t seen it, their reviews on Glassdoor.com are illuminating.  Not as illuminating as talking with someone who has visited the site, but still worth an idle half hour…

For Bezos this is in theory a step on the way to orbit, but they’re sure dawdling; Eric Berger has been tearing in to them lately in a series of articles and it’s certainly interesting reading.  Seems it takes a lot more to reach orbit than just being one of the worlds richest people…

In reply to wintertree:

Berger writes well (would really recommend Liftoff) but he is spacex's chief sycophant. Still, his book tells a story of how close it all came to folding. Certainly wasn't looking like one of the world's richest people when the first falcon success happened.

 Michael Hood 11 Jul 2021
In reply to Archmagos_Dominus:

Where does space start? - there's no "accepted by all" definition. 100km (the Kármán Line) is one widely used definition but NASA use 50miles (80km) and deem anyone who's gone that high an "Astronaut".

In reply to Michael Hood:

> Where does space start? - there's no "accepted by all" definition. 100km (the Kármán Line) is one widely used definition but NASA use 50miles (80km) and deem anyone who's gone that high an "Astronaut".

I don't think anyone has a higher threshold than the Kármán Line, and afaik only NASAs is below it, so if I was going to sell astronaut badges in the gift shop, I'd probably make my spaceship cross it.

 summo 11 Jul 2021
In reply to Archmagos_Dominus:

I'd say space must be point that if you shut the engines off entirely, you'd orbit indefinitely. I've no idea how high that is. 

3
 Maggot 11 Jul 2021
In reply to summo:

I've occasionally wondered where real space begins. The ISpaceS obviously needs to be a bit higher ...

https://heavens-above.com/IssHeight.aspx

In reply to summo:

That's very high. Higher than most satellites even.

And not something a suborbital flight can ever do. Today's flight is a straight up, straight down deal. Orbit is sideways really really fast. Different game.

 Lankyman 11 Jul 2021
In reply to summo:

> I'd say space must be point that if you shut the engines off entirely, you'd orbit indefinitely. I've no idea how high that is. 

If no-one can hear you scream, then you're in space

 ewanjp 11 Jul 2021
In reply to Longsufferingropeholder:

Suborbital can go as high as you like, it's the sideways speed that gets you into orbit not the height. The north Korean ICBMs go up 1500km on their test flights for the example. 

1
In reply to ewanjp:

Stay up there indefinitely? Don't think so.

In reply to Longsufferingropeholder:

> Stay up there indefinitely? Don't think so.

Not a bad idea, leave beardy and baldy up there whizzing around having their pissing contest forever. 

2
 Snyggapa 11 Jul 2021
In reply to summo:

It's always going to be an arbitrary definition, although if you went straight up, gravity would ensure that eventually you would always come back no matter how far you went. Either that or you would be attracted towards another object by its gravity.

I would suggest that a point that you need to carry your own oxygen to power the engine is another alternative. Again, no idea how high that is

 ewanjp 11 Jul 2021
In reply to Longsufferingropeholder:

I wasn't saying you'd stay up there. I was just making the point that subborobital can be really high. But to get in orbit you need to go really fast. 

In reply to ewanjp:

The post you were replying to said that, which is why I was confused.

In reply to Snyggapa:

The Kármán Line is the altitude (roughly, and to a round number) where the air is so thin that if you were going fast enough to fly you'd be going fast enough to orbit.

In reply to broken spectre:

 B'ecause they're major contributors to f**king it up?

 Blue Straggler 12 Jul 2021
In reply to Timmd:

> Is it environmentally sustainable, too.

No but maybe . Next ! 

1
In reply to sbc23: 199 times!

 MeMeMe 12 Jul 2021
In reply to Snyggapa:

> It's always going to be an arbitrary definition, although if you went straight up, gravity would ensure that eventually you would always come back no matter how far you went. Either that or you would be attracted towards another object by its gravity.

Not if you reach escape velocity! (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escape_velocity)

In reply to Michael Hood:

> Where does space start? - there's no "accepted by all" definition. 100km (the Kármán Line) is one widely used definition but NASA use 50miles (80km) and deem anyone who's gone that high an "Astronaut".

They call it Virgin Galactic because 80km up is enough to tell all your friends but not enough to break your duck.

 elsewhere 12 Jul 2021
In reply to Michael Hood:

> Where does space start?

Virgin vs Ryanair - what would Ryanair space be?

 Toerag 12 Jul 2021
In reply to Rob Parsons:

>  How do the economics stack up? How many people can afford the ticket prices?

It costs between $250k and $55million dollars to go to space depending on who with. So, let's say you need to be worth $100million to afford that.  In 2013 there were in excess of 50,000 people in the world with that much money.  I suspect that number has increased massively since then. There is no shortage of potential customers.

In reply to Toerag:

600 people have put down a deposit already

 mondite 12 Jul 2021
In reply to elsewhere:

> Virgin vs Ryanair - what would Ryanair space be?


Luton?

In reply to elsewhere:

> Virgin vs Ryanair - what would Ryanair space be?

The flights would be really cheap but the spaceport would be on the moon.

 wintertree 12 Jul 2021
In reply to Toerag:

> There is no shortage of potential customers.

Indeed; but if Starship really can eventually get launch costs down to sub $5m , that puts an orbital flight at < $50,000 cost, not leaving so much room for Branson or Bezos' business model in the long run.

Starship of course is just the beginning; the first very large, fully reusable rocket to fly, with the first generation of flight-worthy engines in their design class.  

 elsewhere 12 Jul 2021
In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:

A hundred km from the destination so at ground level.

 magma 12 Jul 2021
In reply to broken spectre:

> What is it with billionaires and their desire to escape the Earth?

they're crazy (about moon/mars and saving humanity) says Lovelock and I agree with him on that in this interview: https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000xyk4/hardtalk-james-lovelock-scie... (not so sure about the rest..)

 Ridge 12 Jul 2021
In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:

> The flights would be really cheap but the spaceport would be on the moon.

Plus oxygen would be an extra at 10 times the ticket price.

 dbapaul 12 Jul 2021
In reply to broken spectre:

Billionaires with private rockets? Global pollution and climate change? Seems like its all getting a bit Stark

In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:

Ryanspace would slap on a surcharge for your "extra" weight when you return from weightlessness.

 mrphilipoldham 12 Jul 2021
In reply to elsewhere:

The wing emergency exit rows with the spacious leg room.

 sbc23 12 Jul 2021
In reply to wintertree:

> > There is no shortage of potential customers.

> Indeed; but if Starship really can eventually get launch costs down to sub $5m , that puts an orbital flight at < $50,000 cost, not leaving so much room for Branson or Bezos' business model in the long run.

> Starship of course is just the beginning; the first very large, fully reusable rocket to fly, with the first generation of flight-worthy engines in their design class.  

Starship is targeting $2million per orbital launch ($900k for the fuel+o2). 100 passengers. $20k per seat. NY-Sydney( or indeed anywhere on Earth) - 30mins. Moon - 3days. 

 wintertree 12 Jul 2021
In reply to sbc23:

> Starship is targeting $2million per orbital launch ($900k for the fuel+o2).

Indeed, but I put $5m per 100-person launch because that’s the point they can out compete the sub orbital people on costs, I think.  Going to be a long time before they get the launch cadence and reliability they need to hit the $2m mark.  

> 100 passengers. $20k per seat. NY-Sydney( or indeed anywhere on Earth) - 30mins. Moon - 3days. 

People will risk a fiery death to go to the moon, but it’s going to be a heck of a long time before retropropulsive rocket landings come anywhere near the survivability level needed for suborbital Earth to Earth commercial flights.  It’s so far removed from aircraft landing in terms of technology maturity and the number of absolutely critical moments in the flight profile that it’s a pipe dream I think.  Highly valuable to the military for oddball stuff but not going to threaten airplanes any time soon.

In reply to wintertree:

The more I think about this, the more I think the people won't be on it for that part. Surely easier for any passengers to part company and land some other way than trying to human rate it. They started with a plan to land dragon that way and decided against in the face of the obvious difficulties in certifying it.

 wercat 13 Jul 2021
In reply to wintertree:

the answer is specialist optimised vehicles from and to orbit, between moon orbit and earth orbit etc etc.

I suggest an incredibly safe station habitat for the orbiting stations made from captured ice brought into this region of space robotically and deeply mined for habitation safe from micrometeorites and radiation, plus the bonus of ice for water and oxygen./hydrogen production in orbit.  As it melts under solar radiation the water could be used in a vast ocean shield around the station.

We'd need a very large one in Mars orbit too unless any of the moons prove useful and easy enough.

But please don't let us turn into the Primes

Post edited at 16:10
 Rob Parsons 14 Jul 2021
In reply to Toerag:

> ...There is no shortage of potential customers.

Maybe. Here's a more sceptical view, from Monday's paper:

https://www.theguardian.com/business/nils-pratley-on-finance/2021/jul/12/wh... :

"It was a reminder that the business model is not straightforward. Initial tickets for a 90-minute flight were sold at $250,000 a pop and Galactic is trying to talk prices higher. Once the initial batch of enthusiasts have had their ride, are there really enough bored multimillionaires in the world to sustain a business that is already valued at $10bn?"

1
 MeMeMe 14 Jul 2021
In reply to Archmagos_Dominus:

Someone just pointed me at this, which I'd never heard before, and I thought it worth sharing - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=goh2x_G0ct4&t=121s

In reply to MeMeMe:

> Someone just pointed me at this, which I'd never heard before, and I thought it worth sharing - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=goh2x_G0ct4&t=121s

That is interesting.  Thanks.  

😃


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