PORT ANGELES — Phillip Storm and Eric Meier brought the Rubicon to Vern Burton Community Center on Wednesday night, the space capsule and nose cone they hope will carry the “average person” to the edge of space.
The Forks-based Space Transport Corp. owners, along with their partner and longtime Forks Realtor Don Grafstrom, told many of at least 50 people milling about the spacecraft how they will launch “tourists” into space, and affordably so.
“This is a step in which we’re are committing ourselves to space tourism and space travel for the average person,” Storm said, while onlookers pondered the white and orange steel and aluminum-plated spacecraft, with an X-Prize logo near the hatch.
Space Transport’s sub-orbital vehicle was inspired by the X-Prize competition, which runs through the end of 2004, the partner said.
Storm and Meier believe the vehicle is capable of winning the U.S. competition in which a $10 million prize is given to the first company that launches one person and ballast equivalent to two other people, or 400 pounds, to the 62.5 mile mark. The spacecraft must safely float back to Earth by parachute and be mostly reusable for another flight.
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The rest of the story appears in Thursday’s Peninsula Daily News.
