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From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Re: I want to go to orbit...
Message-ID: <1991Apr9.134923.12647@cs.rochester.edu>
Date: 9 Apr 91 13:49:23 GMT
References: <33015@edsews.eds.com> <1991Apr8.164602.1@dev8a.mdcbbs.com> <HESKETT.91Apr9073355@polymnia.titan.tsd.arlut.utexas.edu>
Organization: Computer Science Department University of Rochester
Lines: 22

In article <HESKETT.91Apr9073355@polymnia.titan.tsd.arlut.utexas.edu> heskett@titan.tsd.arlut.utexas.edu (Donald Heskett) writes:
>
>If I remember correctly, Truax had built a vehicle, based on surplus
>Atlas vernier engines, to loft a person to 100km (about 62-miles), the
>IAF's definition for the threshold of space, thus qualifying that
>person as an astronaut. Recovery was to be via parachute. Last I
>heard, the vehicle was complete, ready to carry the first person with
>the $1,000,000 ticket price.
...
>I haven't read anything about Truax in perhaps five years and am also
>curious about what he is up to these days, if anything.

Truax sold his "Volksrocket X-3" to the US Navy in the fall of 1988
for $750,000, to be used as a test vehicle for part of the SEALAR
program (a program investigating using a two-stage sea-launched rocket
to put 10,000 lb. into low orbit, with the recoverable first stage
recovered 400 miles downrange in the ocean).

What's the status of SEALAR, guys?

	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu