Space Frontier Conference Trip
Returned Sunday evening from Space Frontier Conference 13 in Long Beach, CA. The conference covered activities and plans in cutting edge entrepreneurial space ventures. Philosophical and spiritual aspects of the space settlement vision were also discussed.

Noteworthy topics include the volatile status of the Commercial Space Launch Amendments Act of 2004, designed to smooth the regulatory environment for the suborbital spaceflight industry. Congress has just recessed until after the November elections, but is expected to return for a 'lameduck' session. Stay tuned to space news sources such as HobbySpace RLV News for developments and citizen action items.

The now historic Ansari X-Prize is planned to be followed up by an exciting X-Prize Cup tournament to be held yearly in New Mexico, according to Bill Gaubatz, representing New Mexico's state space business efforts.

The highlight of the conference at Saturday night's banquet was Scaled Composite's Burt Rutan, famed designer of SpaceShipOne which claimed the X-Prize last Monday. Mr. Rutan received the Space Frontier Foundation's coveted Vision to Reality award on behalf of the SpaceShipOne team, and generously spent nearly 2 hours explaining the project, showing videos and answering questions.

The conference venue was the majestic Queen Mary. The ship which now serves as a hotel, conference center and tourist attraction has a proud history both as a civilian luxury liner and as a troop transport on which many thousands of Allied troops, including my father, sailed on during their service in World War II.