Joy of Museums Virtual Tours

Virtual Tours of Museums, Art Galleries, and Historic Sites

SpaceShipOne

SpaceShipOne

SpaceShipOne

SpaceShipOne completed the first human-crewed private spaceflight in 2004 and won the US$10 million Ansari X Prize. Almost one-hundredth years after the Wright Brothers’ historic first powered flight.

As part of this project, the Mojave Air and Space Port was the first commercial spaceport licensed in the United States. And the first pilot of SpaceShipOne became the first licensed U.S. commercial astronaut.

SpaceShipOne was an experimental air-launched rocket-powered aircraft with suborbital flight speeds of up to 900 m/s (3,000 ft/s), using a hybrid rocket motor.

The design features a unique “feathering” atmospheric reentry system where the rear half of the wing and the twin tail booms folded upward along a hinge running the length of the wing; this increased drag while providing stability.

SpaceShipOne

The rear half of the wing and the twin tail booms folded-up to provide a “feathering” atmospheric reentry system

SpaceShipOne

  • Title:                    SpaceShipOne
  • Crew:                   One pilot
  • Length:                28 ft (8.53 m)
  • Wingspan:          16 ft 5 in (8.05 m)
  • Loaded weight:  7,920 lb (3,600 kg)
  • Burn time:           80 seconds
  • Powerplant:        1 × N2O/HTPB SpaceDev Hybrid rocket, 7,500 kgf (74 kN)
  • Max speed:          Mach 3.09 (2,170 mph, 3,518 km/h)
  • Range:                  35 nm (40 mi, 65 km)
  • Museum:             National Air and Space Museum

SpaceShip One X-Prize Flight #1 Launch

Tour of the National Air and Space Museum

A Tour of Air and Space Museums

SpaceshipOne

Science and Technology Museums

SpaceShipOne

Military and War Museums and Memorials

SpaceShipOne

~~~

“Isn’t it astonishing that all these secrets have been preserved for so many years,
just so we could discover them!”

-Orville Wright

~~~


Photo Credit: 1)By Joyofmuseums (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0 (creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], via Wikimedia Commons 2) Ad Meskens [Attribution, CC BY-SA 3.0 (creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0) or GFDL (gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html)], via Wikimedia Commons

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