

SpaceX craft launches from Florida - MikeCapone
http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/12/08/space.flight/index.html

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bcl
SPLASHDOWN!! They did it!

I am appalled at the lack of 'mainstream media' coverage of this historic
event. SpaceX has accomplished something that only governments have done
before. Let the 2nd space race begin :)

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rickr
The launch went great and the Dragon capsule is in orbit. It will be doing 2
to 3 orbits and with the de-orbit burn in about 2 hours from now. Very cool!

A link to the press kit:

<http://www.spacex.com/downloads/cots1-20101206.pdf>

Elon is saying cargo to the ISS in a year.

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InclinedPlane
If a foreign government had done this rather than a private US corporation it
would be heralded as the start of that country's manned space program and
receive far more coverage in the media.

As it stands this is probably much more significant than if a government had
done it, it heralds a new era of private manned spaceflight. An era that may
see space travel opened up not just to a handful of carefully selected
astronauts but to the entire public at large.

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physcab
I don't this this is about government vs. private corporation. I just don't
think anyone cares about space anymore.

My sister goes to Purdue and when they dedicated the Neil Armstrong building
the school had just built, there were apparently 15 or 16 astronauts in
attendance. You know how many students showed up to hear them talk? A few
dozen. Purdue has like 30 or 40k students and they couldn't even fill a
classroom.

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VladRussian
>I just don't think anyone cares about space anymore.

because of the stagnation of the government space exploration programs there
have been very little new achieved in space in decades - thus lack of general
interest (with notable exceptions may be like Hubble&Chandra, Mars rovers, and
GPS/mapping - each of which spurned a lot of interest, activity and
development in their respective niches). Put the man on Mars - you'll have all
the 40K trying to squeeze in to listen. Or even back on the Moon ... just for
a week :)

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InclinedPlane
Being a government astronaut doesn't have the same allure as it once did,
largely because they tend to do the same sorts of things that astronauts
already did 40 years ago. Or, indeed, less interesting things as humans
haven't left low Earth orbit since the mid '70s.

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marze
Perspective:

SpaceX total expenditures $0.4B

Result: Launch vehicle developed, capsule successfully launched into orbit and
recovered

Government-run Constellation program total expenditures $10B

Result: at least eight years and $15B from such a test

Score: 1-0 private sector

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krschultz
Doesn't SpaceX have a $1.6B contract with Nasa right now?

edit, 1.9B contract, 600M spent by SpaceX so far, 300M of that from NASA, the
rest from private money.

Don't forget, NASA is nursing the private industry to life. They're not
stupid, they know their budget would go much farther if they had cheap access
to launch into space. Constellation was largely welfare for Boeing and
Lockheed.

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marze
The large contract with NASA is for future launch services, NASA has only paid
SpaceX $250M or so to date.

Bang for buck is good, $1/4B vs $25B for Constellation.

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dantheman
I watched the live stream of this, and it was awesome...

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billswift
Gizmodo has videos and stuff here - [http://gizmodo.com/5709153/the-first-
private-orbital-spacecr...](http://gizmodo.com/5709153/the-first-private-
orbital-spacecraft-launch?skyline=true&s=i)

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jonknee
I saw it by chance while driving in Tampa and because of the "missile off
California" hoopla convinced myself it was a contrail. Always nice to see a
launch, even if not close up.

