On my bookshelf, Gerard O’Neill’s seminal book from ’77 sits next to the bolt from the landing legs of the first Falcon 9 Block 5 to fly twice (Bangabandhu and then Merah Putih).
Sir Arthur Clarke saw the essential step of reusable boosters:
“‘Escaping from Earth will not always be astronomically expensive; the energy needed to reach space is remarkably small. About 800 pounds of kerosene and liquid oxygen, costing some $25, will liberate enough energy to carry a man to the moon. The fact that we currently burn a thousand tons per passenger indicates that there is vast room for improvement. This will come… most important of all, through the development of reusable boosters, which can be flown for hundreds of missions, like normal aircraft. We have to get away, as quickly as possible, from today’s missile-oriented philosophy of rocket launchers which are discarded after a single flight.’
When I wrote these words in July 1969, the Apollo 11 astronauts were on their way to the moon.
I envisaged that the true Space Age would dawn
‘…and projects which today are barely feasible will become not only relatively easy but economically self-supporting. The closing years of this century should see the beginnings of commercial space flight, which will be directed first toward giant manned satellites or space platforms within a thousand miles above the Earth’s surface.’ [think ISS]
Well in those heady days of Apollo, I couldn’t have anticipated all the detours and distractions of the 1970s that delayed our optimistic projections.
Commercial space flight is now beginning to be technologically feasible and soon will become economically viable. The rise of citizen astronauts has already begun — this time, I doubt if politics can hold up progress because it is no longer so closely tied to the fluctuating interests and resources of national governments.
Fortunately, we need not rely solely on governments for expanding humanity’s presence beyond the Earth.
In that sense, space travel is returning to where it started: with maverick pioneers dreaming of journeys to orbit and beyond”
— Sir Arthur Clarke, October 4, 2007,
foreward to Linehan’s SpaceShipOne
He died five months later. He did not get the chance to see any of SpaceX’s successful launches… making his dream manifest.
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