Per Ardua Ad Astra

[ORAC]

Torygraph: British pilot unveiled as first captain of Virgin Galactic space flights

A British pilot is set to fulfil his childhood dream by becoming the first captain to fly tourists into space.

David Mackay, 53, will be the chief pilot for Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic when it begins the first sub-orbital space flights by 2013. More than 400 passengers have already paid £125,000 for the privilege of a weightless flight 100km above the earth's surface.

Mr Mackay, of Salisbury, Wilts., has held a lifelong ambition to a space pilot after watching the 1969 moon landings on TV as a schoolboy.

He said: ''I was a frustrated astronaut all my life. I grew up at a time when space seemed to have no boundaries and lots of us presumed humans would be living on the moon and landing on Mars. When I was 12, I saw the Apollo moon landings and I thought that was really fantastic and exciting and thought that's what I want to do. 'I found out that those astronauts were ex-test pilots, so I rather ambitiously decided that I would join the RAF, become a test pilot, then become an astronaut.''

Mr Mackay has temporarily swapped his home for the Mojave Desert testing ranges in California taking test flights in Virgin's WhiteKnightTwo 'mothership'.

He spent 16 years with the RAF before joining Virgin Atlantic in 1995, working as a captain with Virgin Atlantic.

Mr Mackay is one of four pilots selected to become Virgin Galactic test pilots working with the development team at Virgin's Spaceport centre in the US........

[mmitch]

Until recently he flew with the Shuttleworth Collection too!
mmitch.

[Dengue_Dude]

Until recently he flew with the Shuttleworth Collection too!

That'd be on the 747-200 then . . .

[high spirits]

But, but ......intergalactic travel could all be done much more effectively and cheaper on an aircraft carrier with some harriers, bleat bleat.

Where's my I-pod?

[Fire 'n' Forget]

Wow if it is a space ship how are they going to cope without a naval career structure to venture away and operate from terra firma

[Wyler]

High Spirits

[SOSL]

Space Hotel

Virgin Galactic are planning an orbiting hotel for the paying space travellers. It's bound to be stylish and well appointed but it won't have much atmosphere!

[StopStart]

SOSL

[SOSL]

SS

I wish I knew how to do that!

[Really annoyed]

That's easy....................

[Lima Juliet]

What will be funny is if he manages to beat Major Tim Peake into space - especially after all the bluster from the Army's "Teeny Weeny Airways" mates!

LJ

[FODPlod]

Captain's Log: Stardate -311414.67567224754

Originally Posted by Fire 'n' Forget

Wow if it is a space ship how are they going to cope without a naval career structure to venture away and operate from terra firma

Luckily we can follow the precedent set by Starfleet. Starfleet Command is run by Admirals, uses naval terminology and has a career structure incorporating naval ranks. Its spacecraft (including the flagship USS Enterprise) are even built in Starfleet Shipyards.

[high spirits]

.....that explains why the British Space Programme never got beyond the Isle of Wight then!

[Archimedes]

Originally Posted by FODPlod

Luckily we can follow the precedent set by Starfleet. Starfleet Command is run by Admirals, uses naval terminology and has a career structure incorporating naval ranks. Its spacecraft (including the flagship USS Enterprise) are even built in Starfleet Shipyards.

That's American Starfleet. Royal Starfleet would be led by members of the seaman branch with all the right warfare & watchkeeping courses, but no intergalatic experience bar being invited to the wedding of an astronaut mate of his (whose career peaked at Commander), and filtering out most of the advice from the one astronaut/aviator on his staff. And the paper proposing that this was a silly way of doing things and proposing a much better approach would've been squashed on spurious grounds, despite making it to the Sec of State's office, as various surface fleet and submarine officers gently explained that aviators have litte understanding of wider fleet issues, making them inappropriate for command even in an environment where you'd have thought they'd be the most suited to the job...

(Any similarities with a sponsored research paper into career strutures for aviators in the era of CVF are entirely conicidental. Allegedly)

[high spirits]

Sounds like the famous quote about non fast jet types lacking the intellectual capacity to make 3-star....

Inspiring leadership