Planet Earth from SpaceShipOne
Credit:
Scaled Composites
On
June 21st, pilot Mike Melvill made a historic flight
in the winged craft
dubbed SpaceShipOne -- the first private
manned mission to space.
The spaceship reached an altitude of just over 62 miles
(100 kilometers) on a
suborbital trajectory,
similar to the early space flights in NASA's
Mercury Program.
So, how was the view?
A video camera on an earlier
test
flight that climbed 40 miles recorded this picture
looking west over the southern California coast and
the Earth's limb.
In the foreground, the nozzle of SpaceShipOne's hybrid
rocket is visible along with
the edge of the wing in a "feathered" configuration
for reentry.
SpaceShipOne was designed and built by
Burt Rutan and his company Scaled Composites to
compete for the 10 million dollar
X Prize.