Nightline 9/28: Burt Rutan and the final frontier (pursuing the X-Prize)

[Bozita]

Nightline Daily E-Mail
September 28, 2004


TONIGHT'S FOCUS: They are, and I'm sorry, I couldn't resist...trying to go where no civilian has gone before. They are after the X-Prize, a prize for the first people to send a pilot to the edge of space in what is, in essence, a home-made craft. Are they nuts? Well, maybe.

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Let me get past my personal resentment first, and then we'll get to tonight's broadcast. One of the great things about this business is that we sometimes get to do very cool things. Yes, we cover important stories, we can change the agenda, and every once in a while, change history. But we also get to have a fair amount of fun every once in a while. And I'm not talking about the people that find war and things like that "fun," that's a whole different issue. But one of the producers of tonight's broadcast, Rick Wilkinson, has gone way beyond the rest of us. He and correspondent Judy Muller got to ride the "vomit comet," the planes that go up and, by flying a parabolic arch, create a situation of zero gravity for about thirty seconds. Those of us who grew up on the space program in the 60s remember those shots of the astronauts-in-training bouncing around the inside of the plane. That's how Ron Howard shot much of "Apollo 13." It is something that I have always wanted to do. Rick and Judy did it. I'm trying to be a grownup about this.

So now to the show. Tomorrow, Burt Rutan, one of the great aeronautical designers in this country, and the man who designed and built the Voyager, the plane that flew around the world without refueling, will launch his try for the prize. To win, you have to send someone up twice in two weeks. He is clearly the leader, but by no means the only one in the hunt. Judy Muller, you know, the one that got to go into zero-gravity but I'm over that, will report on Rutan's efforts. Dave Marash will take a look at some of the other, less well-financed, programs. With the shuttle program grounded, and NASA in apparent disarray, is this the future of space travel? Airline mogul Richard Branson has already said that he is planning to launch space tourism in about three years or so. Tickets won't be cheap. But in a time when it seems that just about everything has been conquered, that there are no more "firsts" left to be had, these teams are trying to break a frontier on their own. It should be a lot of fun to watch. Chris Bury will anchor tonight, and I hope that you'll join us. In this time of war and terrorism and all of the bad news that we focus on so often, it's a nice change to just take a look at people who want to do something that hasn't been done before. Why? Aside from the prize money, because it hasn't been done before. And you have to love that.

Leroy Sievers and the Nightline Staff
Nightline Offices
ABC News Washington Bureau