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is it out of control?The Virgin Galactic spacecraft crash which killed one pilot and left another seriously injured was 'inevitable' as the rocket was 'crude' and 'unreliable', Richard Branson's biographer has claimed.
Tom Bower said the Virgin boss's bold plans for a space tourism company were always going to end in tragedy and claimed engineers told him the project was 'very dangerous'.
He said numerous engineers have walked out of the factory in recent months, with one reportedly saying he would never work there again.
The writer, who penned Branson Behind The Mask, said the project has been plagued with problems since an early version of the nitrous oxide liquid fuel tank exploded in 2007, killing three workers.
Wreckage rained from the sky yesterday as one pilot was ejected from the cockpit using a parachute, while the other was reportedly left strapped to his seat as he plummeted to earth and died.It was the spacecraft's first test flight and was loaded with an experimental new rocket fuel.
'What happened yesterday was very sad for the pilot obviously but it was predictable and inevitable and has never been a secret,' Mr Bower told Radio 4's Today programme.
'It's a very crude rocket. It uses a gas called nitrous oxide burning solid rubber and it has been formed out of a completely different craft.
'All the engineers in California working on the project I've spoken to said it was very dangerous, just a few weeks ago the last of many of the Virgin Galactic engineers walked out of the factory and said he'd never work there again.'
The first disaster in the fuel history of Virgin Galactic came in 2007, when an early version of the nitrous oxide liquid fuel tank exploded, killing three employees.
The blast, at an outdoor test facility belonging to partner company Scaled Composites, killed employees Todd Ivens, Eric Blackwell and Charles May, who were watching the test from behind a chain link fence.
Doesnt sound good for him continuing with the launch knowing the problems.
Tom Bower said the Virgin boss's bold plans for a space tourism company were always going to end in tragedy and claimed engineers told him the project was 'very dangerous'.
He said numerous engineers have walked out of the factory in recent months, with one reportedly saying he would never work there again.
The writer, who penned Branson Behind The Mask, said the project has been plagued with problems since an early version of the nitrous oxide liquid fuel tank exploded in 2007, killing three workers.
Wreckage rained from the sky yesterday as one pilot was ejected from the cockpit using a parachute, while the other was reportedly left strapped to his seat as he plummeted to earth and died.It was the spacecraft's first test flight and was loaded with an experimental new rocket fuel.
'What happened yesterday was very sad for the pilot obviously but it was predictable and inevitable and has never been a secret,' Mr Bower told Radio 4's Today programme.
'It's a very crude rocket. It uses a gas called nitrous oxide burning solid rubber and it has been formed out of a completely different craft.
'All the engineers in California working on the project I've spoken to said it was very dangerous, just a few weeks ago the last of many of the Virgin Galactic engineers walked out of the factory and said he'd never work there again.'
The first disaster in the fuel history of Virgin Galactic came in 2007, when an early version of the nitrous oxide liquid fuel tank exploded, killing three employees.
The blast, at an outdoor test facility belonging to partner company Scaled Composites, killed employees Todd Ivens, Eric Blackwell and Charles May, who were watching the test from behind a chain link fence.
Doesnt sound good for him continuing with the launch knowing the problems.
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Replies: 33
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doesnt care, just wave a union jack and gurn into the camera and British public lap it up
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Sometimes we have to take risks to achieve anything in this life
Going into space is always dangerous Still if his rockets keep blowing up, I wonder how many fare paying passengers he is going to attract? RIP the pilot |
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I didn't need to guess hard that the post is the sort of one side attack you get in the Daily Mail, and what do you know, it's a copy paste from the Mail site.
All space flight is going to be dangerous, it's up to the engineers to minimise it. It's not Branson designing and building the rocket propuluson unit, he's an entreupeneur not a bearded Von Braun. I refuse to believe what they are doing is inherently impossible, it seems a good idea for getting things into space efficiently. The world needs people like Branson, the gloating in some failure linked to him is just so .... British  . |
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agree Just Checking
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being a test pilot is surely a very dangerous occupation.
Bower has a very large axe to grind and many books to sell, so i'd prefer a more objective assessment of the danger posed by what was being tried and supposed staff walk outs. |
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Exactly, DStyle. What is his actual relationship with Branson?
People seem to think biographer means someone who is a confidant/friend, an expert, and is approved. I could be a biographer of anyone I want to be, doesn't mean I know them or I'm fair to them as such. |
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agree, it sounds very like 'sour grapes' to me
The pilots were brave, everybody men and women, who go into space are brave, remember the 'Challenger' disaster Getting into space is a long way from being risk free To get there means sitting on a very large bomb basically, hopefully in years to come it will be safer |
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just checkingi agree space travel is dangerous and that certain risks are involved.
However when you have your engineers walking out saying its to dangerous, why not delay the launch and check out the safety issues. Peoples lives are in danger, and its only a certain ego will push it through when their is such questions asked from his own engineers. Of course i copied and pasted it, i dont know him from adam or the issues behind the scenes with his engineers. |
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TBH I'm not sure I'd go up in the thing even if it was free though, unless I could lay off mid flight if I didn't like the look of things ;)
I'd like to go up in a U2 or some other very high flying plane, they pretty much touch space anyway, I remember some documentary, they were in space suits, darkness of space above, saw curvature of the earth. That would be enough! Back to the Branson thing : I'm sure he's not a rocket expert and he's relying on the people below him to make the technical decisions. There will be a reason for the change of motor. From what I'm reading they apparently changed the design as they thought it would be more stable, not less, it doesn't appear to be a cost cutting measure. |
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I hope he doesn't change the recipe of his pickle.
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just checking, all you can do is make it as safe as you possibly can. But of course its a dangerous industry.
However from the report it seems lots of his engineers were not happy with the safety, some even quitting over it. When peoples lives are in danger you must then re consider and do further testing. But maybe his ego couldnt say lets hold off for a bit. |
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i mean article rather than report.
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I hope he doesn't change the ingredients of his pickle.
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There's far too much condimentnation of Branson in this thread.
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6 mins apart and virtually the same wording. You couldn't make it up.
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just checking,re Bower, his relationship is that he has written numerous books taking sideswipes at Branson.
and in truth, he needs to say nothing. In the most litigious country in the world, if unnecessary risks have been taken by a wealthy organisation, a lawsuit wont be far behind. |
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surely bower has his facts about the engineers dstyle? As you say if not a lawsuit will surely follow.
But if he does have his facts, then surely he should highlight a wealthy organisation taking unnecessary risks? |
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Commercial space programmes will always be a fail. Even national state sponsored programmes fail with billions of investment.
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when will they put a man on the moon ?
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"Commercial space programmes will always be a fail."
Why? Thing is even the NASA stuff isn't built as such by the state, it's commercial companies subcontracted to do the work to the specification. And so the famous quote "When reporters asked Shepard (Alan, Astronaut) what he thought about as he sat atop the Redstone rocket, waiting for liftoff, he had replied, 'The fact that every part of this ship was built by the lowest bidder.'" So commercial space programmes are pretty much the same thing just removing a tier of management? If people need or want stuff in space, then they need someone to provide it. I don't see why it's much different to the aerospace industry and the many companies that produce planes. |
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360 seconds apart and virtually the same wording. You couldn't make it up.
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The thing to remember here is that this this is a commercial operation .Virgin Galactic is a joint venture between Virgin Group and Aabar Investments, a state-backed investment firm in the United Arab Emirates. These chaps want a return on their investment, and the quicker the better. The whole point of the operation is to make money out of very, very rich people so they can have the privilege of seeing the Earth from a very great height, they are not breaking down barriers or doing something that has not been done before, I don't think there is much to be gained from the project in terms of scientific advancement. The project is dead now anyway, no way do the people who have signed up will want to go through with it, now the reality of the risks are in their faces.
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There is a lot of schadenfreude on this thread
People deriving pleasure from Richard Branson's failure although what anyone's gets out of his failure I do not know I hope he continues, if safe of course |
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I think the Human Race needs to get into space
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Well, I would have thought that if the company was formed to provide extremely rich people with a trip into space...then surely, the safety aspect would have a much higher priority than NASA research.
NASA can always use another test pilot/engineer or employee seeking stardom. Virgin has to offer a service that rich people are confident in...otherwise they ain't gonna pay. |
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How come the Betfair IT dept were involved in this?
Shouldn't they be sticking to the exchange and just coc*ing that up from time to time? (And totally separately, sorry for the loss of life and injuries - brave (I wouldn't) men flying these things) |
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If you change something slightly it does not look like a copy and paste job. Not that I am accusing Crisp77 of copying and pasting.
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Have I made the bbc website
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No....just Puns-R-Us.com....again.
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Sorry...http://www.punsrus.net/thepunsters.php
Crisp relaxing at home with her indoors. |
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commercial space flight does seem a bit of a dream to me
nasa must have had half a dozen fatal accidents in what a 100 or so rocket/shuttle launches and they have limitless funds and expertise surely gonna struggle to find paying customers when the risks of being blown up are still extremely high compared air travel |
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there was a report in the economist a few years ago about how america were encouraging the private sector to make space tourism viable by creating public indemnity programmes where the private company would pay very little if things go wrong and the tax payer would fork out the rest.
Wasnt really an issue while it was all still on paper but the problem is that when things go wrong in this sector they go wrong to the tune of massive $$$$$ Whether the public should be paying the massive difference in claims following a private sector f uck up while catering to only the rich is a serious concern for anyone. Maybe things will be put back in perspective now branson and the other private company who's rocket exploded on take off a few days ago attempting to re-stock the ISS |
