Virgin Galactic
« on: March 14, 2019, 12:35:37 PM »
Round Earther coming in peace.

Recently, Virgin Galactic flew to an altitude of 90 km and is soon(ish) going to allow customers to do the same. This is the first time that the public will have the opportunity to go so high. I understand that it’s crazy expensive ($250,000), but if you were able to make the flight - perhaps Richard Branson let you do it for free - and you saw much more significant curvature than you see from a commercial flight, as they claim you would, what would you make of that observation?

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Offline Bad Puppy

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #1 on: March 14, 2019, 12:51:20 PM »
Round Earther coming in peace.

Recently, Virgin Galactic flew to an altitude of 90 km and is soon(ish) going to allow customers to do the same. This is the first time that the public will have the opportunity to go so high. I understand that it’s crazy expensive ($250,000), but if you were able to make the flight - perhaps Richard Branson let you do it for free - and you saw much more significant curvature than you see from a commercial flight, as they claim you would, what would you make of that observation?

Windows cause distortion. An curvature, however consistent with the round earth is caused by the windows. Or a camera. Or some other unexplainable phenomena created by flat earthers.
Quote from: Tom Bishop
...circles do not exist and pi is not 3.14159...

Quote from: totallackey
Do you have any evidence of reality?

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Offline Dr David Thork

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #2 on: March 14, 2019, 01:03:37 PM »
In late 2004 Richard Branson announced he would send the first paying customers into 'space' by 2007-2008.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2004/sep/27/spaceexploration.travelnews

Being as this 3 year project is now 15 years later, I'm not going to hold my breath.
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Offline ChrisTP

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #3 on: March 14, 2019, 02:01:52 PM »
Round Earther coming in peace.

Recently, Virgin Galactic flew to an altitude of 90 km and is soon(ish) going to allow customers to do the same. This is the first time that the public will have the opportunity to go so high. I understand that it’s crazy expensive ($250,000), but if you were able to make the flight - perhaps Richard Branson let you do it for free - and you saw much more significant curvature than you see from a commercial flight, as they claim you would, what would you make of that observation?

Windows cause distortion. An curvature, however consistent with the round earth is caused by the windows. Or a camera. Or some other unexplainable phenomena created by flat earthers.
Just move your head around and if the earth happens to curve upwards too, then you can blame windows. I don't think it's impossible to tell the difference between looking through distorted glass and looking at a curved earth... That's even assuming the glass on this craft is going to be distorting things all that much.
Tom is wrong most of the time. Hardly big news, don't you think?

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Offline AATW

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #4 on: March 14, 2019, 02:34:32 PM »
In late 2004 Richard Branson announced he would send the first paying customers into 'space' by 2007-2008.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2004/sep/27/spaceexploration.travelnews

Being as this 3 year project is now 15 years later, I'm not going to hold my breath.
After Boris's failed vanity Garden Bridge project which has now been scrapped having cost a huge amount of money do you now not believe in bridges? Or gardens?
When I were a lad it was all "we'll have flying cars by the year 2000". Some problems are just hard and expensive to solve.
Why are we not all zooming across the Atlantic faster than Concorde now? Because propulsion is costly. So aircraft have improved in other ways, notably comfort and entertainment options.
This is a hard problem to solve, making space travel accessible to the average Joe. It's disappointing we're not there yet, even Virgin Galactic if it ever gets off the ground won't do it, it will be for the super rich. But projects being delayed and problems being more complicated than anticipated doesn't imply anything "going on", necessarily.
Tom: "Claiming incredulity is a pretty bad argument. Calling it "insane" or "ridiculous" is not a good argument at all."

TFES Wiki Occam's Razor page, by Tom: "What's the simplest explanation; that NASA has successfully designed and invented never before seen rocket technologies from scratch which can accelerate 100 tons of matter to an escape velocity of 7 miles per second"

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Offline WellRoundedIndividual

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #5 on: March 14, 2019, 02:59:38 PM »
People like Branson are visionaries. Real life does not happen according to people's predictions. Sometimes it serves simply as a catalyst to create something new or something improved.  Star Trek predicted cell phones in the 60s - the first brick cell phone for public use was what...late 80s, early 90s? Some things do not always come to fruition either. The genius Tesla was working on wireless energy - that never happened. (Insert the start of government conspiracy theories here, please lol).
BobLawBlah.

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Offline Dr David Thork

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #6 on: March 14, 2019, 05:13:17 PM »
After Boris's failed vanity Garden Bridge project which has now been scrapped having cost a huge amount of money do you now not believe in bridges? Or gardens?
When I were a lad it was all "we'll have flying cars by the year 2000". Some problems are just hard and expensive to solve.
Why are we not all zooming across the Atlantic faster than Concorde now? Because propulsion is costly. So aircraft have improved in other ways, notably comfort and entertainment options.
This is a hard problem to solve, making space travel accessible to the average Joe. It's disappointing we're not there yet, even Virgin Galactic if it ever gets off the ground won't do it, it will be for the super rich. But projects being delayed and problems being more complicated than anticipated doesn't imply anything "going on", necessarily.

When they said "flying cars" ... that was 50 years earlier ... not 3 years. When you say you will do something in 3 years that suggests you are using known technologies ... not inventing new ones.

Branson is actually trying to do something relatively simply. Fly to an altitude of 100km. This is a slight of hand suggesting that space starts at 100km because of the Karman Line definition. Which frankly is a very stupid definition.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kármán_line

This in itself would sound like a challenge (get an aircraft above 100km), if it hadn't already been done some 50 years earlier by NASA.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_X-15

All Branson is trying to do is make an 8 seat x-15. Big whoop. He even does it the exact same way ... drop from a large airliner and use a rocket to boost to over 100km.

However, how serious is he?

Well to buy a small off-the shelf passenger aircraft like an Airbus a320 costs about $80m. But Branson owns a spaceship! Wow. That sounds super expensive.

Oh wait. Total Current Assets = £5.9m.
https://companycheck.co.uk/company/05802809/VIRGIN-GALACTIC-LIMITED/companies-house-data

But you own a spaceship, right? What about your launch pad in the Mojave Desert? The aircraft that drops the spaceship - White Knight? The buildings, the merch store? How can all these things be worth less than £6m?

... unless of course none of these things are actually what you say they are. If in fact they are cheap mock ups and Virgin Galactic is no more than a marketing tool for Virgin Atlantic. But wait, who in their right mind would want to promise people spaceships to boost the brand perception of their airline?



Virgin Galactic is a very old marketing gimmick to give a dull airline a halo effect. Never has Branson had any intention of flying anyone into 'space' ever. It is like pinning your hopes on a company being able to train Meerkats to talk.
« Last Edit: March 14, 2019, 05:18:11 PM by Baby Thork »
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Offline stack

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #7 on: March 14, 2019, 11:02:07 PM »
All Branson is trying to do is make an 8 seat x-15. Big whoop. He even does it the exact same way ... drop from a large airliner and use a rocket to boost to over 100km.

Seems pretty complicated to me. Not to mention there are 6 civilians on board trained in nothing. But maybe you know better how simple it is to translate X-15 tech to Galactic for wealthy consumers.

However, how serious is he?

Depends upon what you mean by serious and serious about what. Sure it's a brand awareness ploy. So what? He's selling an image. A "You too can fly into 'space', call yourself an astronaut, experience 5 minutes of weightlessness and then tell your foursome on the first tee at the club all about it..."

Whether this all comes to fruition, I guess we'll just wait and see. He's got $175m in ticket sales already. So as long as Galactic doesn't kill a bunch of passengers, there might be money to be made. And I think that's mostly what he is serious about.

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Offline Dr David Thork

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #8 on: March 15, 2019, 09:32:42 PM »
That $175m has been a 15 year interest free loan. He'll have to give those inflation ravaged deposits back at some point.
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Offline stack

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #9 on: March 15, 2019, 10:04:45 PM »
That $175m has been a 15 year interest free loan. He'll have to give those inflation ravaged deposits back at some point.

Or not. He could just deliver on the promise.

After the 2014 crash 20 or so ticket holders asked for a refund. From what I read, they got it. I'm sure the T&C's on the tickets are about 4 feet long and probably have a timebound refund window, and a whole slew of stuff. I guess, rather than a purchase, maybe it's more of an investment. Instead of doubling your money after X amount of time your payoff is to be able to call yourself an 'astronaut'. A gamble for sure. But if you have $200-$250k to burn on a 'space' flight maybe you're ok with the risk.

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Offline Dr David Thork

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #10 on: March 15, 2019, 10:09:21 PM »
Or maybe you are just a fool ... and a fool and their money are soon parted.
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Offline stack

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #11 on: March 16, 2019, 12:38:01 AM »
Could be. Time will tell. Neither of us know one way or the other. Branson is the first one to go up. So if and when he does and makes it back, I'll presume other paying customers will follow.

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Offline Dr David Thork

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #12 on: March 16, 2019, 12:44:56 AM »
It doesn't matter whether you are round earth or flat earth, we are all hoping he doesn't make it back.
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Offline stack

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #13 on: March 16, 2019, 12:59:28 AM »
It doesn't matter whether you are round earth or flat earth, we are all hoping he doesn't make it back.

You totally just got crossed off the guest list at Sir Richard's island in the Bahamas.

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Offline Dr David Thork

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #14 on: March 16, 2019, 01:14:17 AM »
It doesn't matter whether you are round earth or flat earth, we are all hoping he doesn't make it back.

You totally just got crossed off the guest list at Sir Richard's island in the Bahamas.
His island is in the British Virgin Islands. You know, Virgin ... like his company.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/The+Bahamas/@24.3680641,-80.4617189,6z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x88d69a3bb2480f3d:0x133eb4836ac779e5!8m2!3d25.03428!4d-77.39628
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Offline stack

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Re: Virgin Galactic
« Reply #15 on: March 16, 2019, 02:25:14 AM »
It doesn't matter whether you are round earth or flat earth, we are all hoping he doesn't make it back.

You totally just got crossed off the guest list at Sir Richard's island in the Bahamas.
His island is in the British Virgin Islands. You know, Virgin ... like his company.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/The+Bahamas/@24.3680641,-80.4617189,6z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x88d69a3bb2480f3d:0x133eb4836ac779e5!8m2!3d25.03428!4d-77.39628

Apparently you're banned from BVI as well. Well done. I was looking to be your +1.