Skip to footer

Private 'space' balloon passes test, sets new record

The private spaceflight company World View says that an unmanned test of its stratospheric balloon flight system has broken the world record for highest parafoil flight.

|
World View
This image released by World View on June 23, 2014, offers a glimpse of the view the company's "Voyagers" will be treated to during flights to 120,000 feet.

A private spaceflight company is one step closer to gently flying passengers to the edge of space with a balloon.

The Arizona-based company World View announced that is has successfully completed an unmanned test of a scaled-down version of its balloon spaceflight system, reaching altitudes of more than 20 miles (32 kilometers). In doing so, company officials say they broke the world record for highest parafoil flight. Photos and video of the test voyage, which took off from New Mexico last week, offer a stunning preview of the vista future passengers will experience for $75,000.

"We couldn't be any more excited about the results from this test flight," Jane Poynter, CEO of World View, said in a statement. [World View's Near-Space Balloon Rides in Pictures]

"It represents a foundational achievement that moves us one step closer to offering a life-changing experience to our Voyagers," Poynter added. (The company has been referring to its customers as "Voyagers.")

World View hopes to launch its first commercial flights by the end of 2016, with about 50 trips in its first year, promising passengers a two-hour "sailing-like experience" inside a pressurized capsule, complete with in-flight Internet access and even cocktails. In an interview with Space.com earlier this year, Poynter said the concept of the company was inspired by the way astronauts describe their experience of going to space.

"What happens is they turn around and they see  Earth and they fall in love with Earth, and it really changes the way they think about things," Poynter said. "We want to be able to give that incredible experience to as many people as we can."

The five-hour test flight launched from Roswell International Air Center in New Mexico on June 18, with a 10-percent scale prototype of World View's balloon spaceflight system floating to an altitude of 120,000 feet, nearly 23 miles (37 km) off the ground — about the altitude World View officials have said their passengers will experience. Photos snapped from the stratosphere show the curvature of the planet against the blackness of space.

When the balloon drifted back down to an altitude of 50,000 feet (15,240 meters), the flight system then relied on a parafoil (a parachute-like wing) to bring it back to the ground. World View officials said they tested a backup safety parafoil, a guided landing system and their ground operations systems during the flight.

This test flight also marked the first voyage of World View's Tycho vehicle, which was carrying theExplorers Club Flag during the trip. Beyond drawing tourists and thrill-seekers, World View also hopes to attract scientific and commercial missions. Company officials said their reusable Tycho craft could be used for projects in communications, surveillance, remote sensing, first response and micro-sat payload delivery.

Follow Megan Gannon on Twitter and Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook or Google+. Originally published on Space.com.

Copyright 2014 SPACE.com, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Private 'space' balloon passes test, sets new record
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2014/0626/Private-space-balloon-passes-test-sets-new-record
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe