My Rocket Racing article now on Popsci.com

Thanks to Clark Lindsey at HobbySpace.com for pointing out that my February Popular Science cover story is now available at PopSci.com. At the moment it's the top story. It should enjoy long life on this page.

"All systems go" for New Mexico spaceport

That's the word from Rick Homans, head of economic development for the state of New Mexico. I phoned into a press conference he gave this afternoon in which he reported that the New Mexico legislature this morning voted to approve spending $100 million in state funds to build the nation's first purpose-built commercial spaceport.

"It's all systems go for the spaceport," Homans told reporters. "We're all very tired and we're all very relieved.... For this whole project to make it through in such good shape...really says a lot about the support from the legislature. There all kinds of things that could have gone wrong that didn't go wrong, so we're thankful for that. Myself and my staff here, we're all passionate about this project. We believe in it, we believe it's good for the state of New Mexico, and we work on it heart and soul. We knew we had a lot at stake during this legislative session; it was a 'yes' or 'no' vote on building a spaceport and launching this new industry in this state. We're happy we got a thumbs up and that we can move forward and fulfill this dream for the state of New Mexico."

Next step is to issue an RFP, some time in March, for the architecture and engineering of the spaceport, said Homans, with a view toward completing design of the spaceport by the end of this year, and bids going out to construction firms to start building by first quarter of next year.

That's contingent on getting an FAA license for the spaceport. To that end, Homans and several other state officials are heading to Washington early next week for talks with FAA officials. They'll also be soliciting additional funding from the federal government.

"We've always viewed this as a project of national significance because it really supports the new U.S. space program and space policy," said Homans.

Homans also reported that the spaceport's inaugural launch, by UP Aerospace, originally scheduled for March 27, has been pushed back to mid-May.

"The Moonlandings: An Eyewitness Account"

When I saw the subtitle of this book I was skeptical. After all, how could someone who hasn't been there write an "eyewitness" account of landing on the moon?

Turns out, though, Reginald Turnill offers a fascinatingly unique perspective on the Apollo era--that of a journalist in the press pool at Cape Canaveral when the moon rockets lifted off.

That perspective especially interests me because I'm a space journalist who missed out on the Apollo era; Turnill puts readers there at the Cape for the thunder of liftoff and the nail-biting drama of landing on the moon, but he also gives us journalists scrambling for the best hotels at the Cape, the mad dash from there after a launch to get to mission control in Houston, and the fierce competition for limited satellite bandwidth to file stories. All of which makes for a captivating read.

Turnill was the BBC's aerospace correspondent during the Apollo flights, well known in Britain for his print, radio, and TV reporting. He got to know many of the astronauts and other major figures of the first space age well, and kept up with them long afterwards.

Among many other memorable sections of the book is Turnill's account of his complicated relationship with Wernher von Braun, the architect of the moon rockets. Most American space enthusiasts know that von Braun also helped to engineer the precursor to the moon rockets, the V2, for Nazi Germany. But though that fact is more or less academic to us Yanks, it was anything but to Turnill and his countrymen and women who suffered under the V2's onslaught during World War II. From page one of the first chapter:

"My own encounters with von Braun started in the late 1950s. The impact in 1944 in Sydenham, south-east London, of one of his first V2 rockets had hastened the arrival of my younger son, and for two years I could not bring myself to shake his hand. After that I was surprised to find quite a warm professional friendship developing between us."

Some of Turnill's insights into the characters of other major space age figures seem especially relevant to the commercial spaceflight industry of today, with its emphasis on sending ordinary people into space. For instance, a section from one of his original reports:

"...it was [Alan Shepard's] ability to face the glare of a television world with a combination of modesty and assurance that really won the hearts of the Americans. We've just seen Yuri Gagarin do exactly the same thing. Like Shepard, he made us feel there was no reason why we should not be spacemen too. All that's needed is a little knowledge and careful training. Supermen were superfluous."

That statement could just as easily apply to Mike Melvill and Brian Binnie, the first commercial astronauts, who blasted into space more than 40 years later.

Apologies to Granger

Oops! I called the RRL's Granger Whitelaw "George" in my Rocket Racing League report on Wired.com, posted today. Working to get it corrected.... Meantime, throw 'em if you got 'em; I deserve it--at least until I get this thing fixed.

--UPDATE at 12:45 ET--
Problem fixed. That'll teach me to proofread more carefully before I ship a story. Now it's a good article.

My editor at Wired News says its the most detailed piece on the recent RRL developments he's seen. I guess we're both biased, but I think I did manage to pack a lot in there and still make it an entertaining read. See for yourself and let me know what you think.