Virgin Galactic Pilot's Long Fall

This is a fun little story. It recaps Peter Siebold's testimony about the destruction of Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo and his fall to earth.

Here's a taste:

Then there was a single bang, he said in the interview. The cabin rapidly depressurized and he felt the air leave his lungs.

Suddenly he heard a high-pitched whistle of the wind and he realized he was in "a very high slipstream of some kind."

He had to work to open his eyes, he said. And when he opened them, he saw the desert below.

His helmet was not straight on his head and his oxygen mask had shifted.

Siebold said he believes he was still sitting in his seat. It was extremely cold. He reached for his seatbelt.

And he falls and falls. The other pilot, Michael Alsbury, did not survive.

***

Oh, and while we're talking about space travel, scientists are saying that a reactionless thrust device called the EM Drive might actually work. A very big deal, if true. Although, it seems to me that even its proponents are treating it like magic. They literally don't know why thrust is occurring and so can't really explain why the drive isn't breaking the law of conservation of momentum.

posted by Gabriel Malor at 04:02 PM

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