FORKS — Two aerospace engineers shooting skyward for a future in space tourism plan to launch their first full-scale spacecraft in July.
But first they’ll take the rocket on the road for display.
Space Transport Corp. partners Phillip Storm and Eric Meier are preparing to load a completely assembled spacecraft — minus rocket-fueled engines — onto a “mobile launch support vehicle” and show it in Forks, Port Angeles and Seattle.
Specific exhibition times, dates and locations are now being planned.
Meier was busy Sunday assembling the rocket’s body.
“I bolted the engine assembly together this morning,” Meier said.
“There’s another two weeks to get the capsule bolted to the top and get it ready.”
Dubbed “Rubicon” by company president Storm and vice president Meier, the rocket called a “suborbital tourism vehicle” is being developed as an affordable option in the burgeoning commercial spaceflight industry.
A low-altitude July test launch of the Rubicon, carrying 600 pounds of weight instead of being manned, will lift the spacecraft to 20,000 feet, said Meier.
Three vehicles are under development at Space Transport’s headquarters in Forks Industrial Park:
A three-stage rocket, the Rubicon, and a “nano-satellite launch vehicle.”
With the three-stage rocket and the satellite launch vehicle, Storm and Meier plan to offer launch services to universities, research groups and private individuals.
In quest of $10 million prize
With Rubicon, Storm and Meier are competing worldwide in the Ansari X Prize competition, an international space race that will give $10 million to the first company or person to launch a manned craft to 62.5 miles above Earth — and then do it again within two weeks.
