Free Republic

A U.S. spaceflight company is hoping the third time's the charm in order to launch a brand-new rocket into space on its maiden flight today (April 21). After two delayed launched attempts, the privately built Antares rocket is once again poised to blast off from a seaside pad at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility on Virginia's Eastern Shore. Liftoff is set for 5 p.m. EDT (2100 GMT). You can watch the Antares rocket launch live on SPACE.com beginning 4:30 p.m. ET (2030 GMT), courtesy of NASA's webcast.

Later this month, a U.S. company plans to make the first private spaceflight to the International Space Station. Much of the space community views the launch by SpaceX as a watershed moment—the opening of the heavens to private industry, and a glimpse of the public-private nature of future spaceflight. The launch also comes as Texas' future in space is increasingly tenuous, with Johnson Space Center's role unclear amid a NASA that won't have its own functional rocket for at least a decade. That's why some Texas space officials are enticed by SpaceX's consideration of building a spaceport in Texas. "The...

I know this is early, but heck I'm excited.

If there was a single word to describe how Burt Rutan and his team felt on the day before their historic flight, it would be confident. All the work preparing SpaceShipOne for its flight has been completed days earlier, and Rutan noted that on Saturday, two days before the planned flight, the hangar was dark all day long. Mike Melvill, the pilot selected to fly SpaceShipOne, could barely contain his enthusiasm during the preflight press conference. “I am ready to go, boy, I am ready to go!” he said in a manner not unlike an athlete revving up for a...

MOJAVE, Calif. — Mike Melvill (search) is hoping to boldly go where no private enterprise has gone before. Melvill was to be in the cockpit Monday of a privately developed rocket plane that seeks to soar into suborbital space, making history as the first non-governmental manned spaceflight.