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SpaceNut

Administrator

From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 29,433

Re: America's Space Prize! $50mil... - Funded by Bigelow.

Here we go with some details of the contest for the 50 million prize.

Las Vegas Hotel Mogul Launches $50 Million Space Prize
http://www.reuters.com/newsArt....6422896

To win the contest, which is limited to U.S.-based ventures, a team must build a five-seat spacecraft without government money and send five astronauts into orbit above the Earth twice within 60 days.

Palomar

Member

From: USA

Registered: 2002-05-30

Posts: 9,734

Re: America's Space Prize! $50mil... - Funded by Bigelow.

Here we go with some details of the contest for the 50 million prize.

Las Vegas Hotel Mogul Launches $50 Million Space Prize
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtm … ...6422896

To win the contest, which is limited to U.S.-based ventures, a team must build a five-seat spacecraft without government money and send five astronauts into orbit above the Earth twice within 60 days.

Bigelow acknowledged that reaching orbit would be much harder than briefly popping into space as SpaceShipOne did.

"To be honest, "I think it's a long shot," he said of any team's chances of winning the prize by 2010 as required.

Bigelow will front half of the $50 million America's Space Prize and he is seeking sponsorship for the other half.

"If no one steps forward, we'll cover it," he said. "We just want to make it happen."

*I hope so...and that this isn't simply publicity-seeking on his part. 

Very ambitious...good luck.  Would be exciting to see this accomplished. 

--Cindy

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We all know [i]those[/i] Venusians: Doing their hair in shock waves, smoking electrical coronas, wearing Van Allen belts and resting their tiny elbows on a Geiger counter...

--John Sladek (The New Apocrypha)

RobertDyck

Moderator

From: Winnipeg, Canada

Registered: 2002-08-20

Posts: 7,936

Website

Re: America's Space Prize! $50mil... - Funded by Bigelow.

Is "America's Space Prize" open to only Americans, or can a Canadian enter? The X-Prize was open to anyone, and two Canadian teams tried.

Palomar

Member

From: USA

Registered: 2002-05-30

Posts: 9,734

Re: America's Space Prize! $50mil... - Funded by Bigelow.

Is "America's Space Prize" open to only Americans, or can a Canadian enter? The X-Prize was open to anyone, and two Canadian teams tried.

(from the article):  "To win the contest, which is limited to U.S.-based ventures,"...

*That's another reason I'm "iffy" about this guy's sincerity.

--Cindy

---

We all know [i]those[/i] Venusians: Doing their hair in shock waves, smoking electrical coronas, wearing Van Allen belts and resting their tiny elbows on a Geiger counter...

--John Sladek (The New Apocrypha)

clark

Member

Registered: 2001-09-20

Posts: 6,374

Re: America's Space Prize! $50mil... - Funded by Bigelow.

NASA can't be involved if you have non-US interests competing. It also creates problems with the State department.

The guy isn't out to save the world, he is out to make a fortune and he is rolling the dice. He needs someone to develop something to carry paying passangers to his hotel, or the whole scheme is kaput.

It also mentions "US-based" ventures. Many a company opens a foreign subsidary to do business within the host country. Same thing probably applies here.

dicktice

Member

From: Nova Scotia, Canada

Registered: 2002-11-01

Posts: 1,764

Re: America's Space Prize! $50mil... - Funded by Bigelow.

Comodore: How about sausage shaped housings, drawn over rigicd prefabricated habitat structures, and then sealed to the smaller diameter airlock housings with engineered-equivalent of drawstrings, and then inflated?

SpaceNut

Administrator

From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 29,433

Re: America's Space Prize! $50mil... - Funded by Bigelow.

Well I do not know much about the construction techniques to be used but it appears that others are now having the same thoughts of space hotels.

Branson aiming to build hotel in space

SpaceNut

Administrator

From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 29,433

Re: America's Space Prize! $50mil... - Funded by Bigelow.

Bigelow Space Module Flight Gets Government Okay

The U.S. Government has given payload approval to Bigelow Aerospace permitting the entrepreneurial firm to launch its inflatable space module technology.

Bigelow Aerospace of North Las Vegas, Nevada has blueprinted a step-by-step program to explore the use of inflatable Earth orbiting modules. Those modules would not only support made-in-microgravity product development, but serve as the technology foundation for eventual space tourist housing and use of similar structures on the Moon and Mars.