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CNN Live Today
First Face-Off; X Prize
Aired September 29, 2004 - 10:59 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Here's what's happening right "Now in the News."
The Department of Homeland Security is alerting Florida officials that tomorrow night's debate could be a potential target for terrorists. But officials say they have no specific intelligence or threat information suggesting the debate actually is a target.
And these are new images of British hostage Kenneth Bigley surfacing today on the Arab language network Al Jazeera. The videotape shows Bigley behind bars in what appears to be a cramped cell. Also, in another development, Bigley's brother tells CNN he has received an e-mail message suggesting his brother will be freed.
And a Yemeni court today sentenced two men to death for their role in the bombing of the USS Cole. Seventeen sailors died when suicide bombers attacked the ship using a boat laden with explosives. The October 2000 attack was linked to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network.
Dozens of North Koreans scaled the wall around the Canadian embassy in Beijing today in a daring bid for asylum. Forty-four people, including eight children, made it into the compound. One disabled man was stopped by an embassy guard. The refugees say they want to go to South Korea.
And up, up and away. Within the past hour, a plane carrying SpaceShipOne took off from the Mojave Desert on a $10 million quest. SpaceShipOne is trying to become the first privately-manned craft to fly into space twice in a two-week period. Our Miles O'Brien is there, and he's going to have a live update.
It's 11:00 a.m. on the East Coast, 8:00 a.m. out West. From the CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Carol Lin. Daryn has the day off today.
Up first on CNN, the presidential candidates get ready for their first face-to-face showdown. President Bush and Senator Kerry head to Florida on the eve of tomorrow night's debate.
National correspondent Frank Buckley is with the Kerry campaign, and he starts our coverage this hour from Dodgeville, Wisconsin -- Frank.
FRANK BUCKLEY, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi there, Carol.
No public event scheduled for Senator Kerry here today. He continues with his debate preparation. We're told that that's taken a number of forms, everything from watching videos of President Bush in past debate situations, to reading briefing papers, to just simply talking through the issues and engaging in mock debates.
While Senator Kerry continues in his debate prep mode, some of his advisers are now moving into the all-important spin mode. Important for setting expectations in advance of the debate, and very important after the debate, as well, because research has shown that many voters take their cues from that post-debate spin or analysis that they see on the TV news, and that's how they decide who has actually won the debate.
So some of the pre-debate spin taking place right now. Here's a taste of that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE LOCKHART, SR. ADVISER, KERRY CAMPAIGN: The debates in the modern political system are not won by the person who knows the most information. They're won by the people who are most persuasive for their position. And George Bush has proved time and time again that he is a very persuasive debater.
It does, of course, seem at times like he doesn't have all the facts straight. But he seems to do it in a way that gives you a sense of commitment and a sense of what direction he wants to go in. And, you know, every debate he's been in, he's won.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BUCKLEY: For Senator Kerry's part, his aides say that he has to demonstrate strength in leadership qualities and offer a choice to voters as they move forward and make their decision on the election. Senator Kerry today will continue his prep mode, debate prep mode here in Wisconsin, and board a plane this afternoon. And he'll arrive in Florida tonight -- Carol.
LIN: Frank, John Kerry has a reputation for knowing the issues absolutely cold. He's a classical debater. So why does he have to spend so much time preparing with these briefing books?
BUCKLEY: It's a great question. He has spent 20 years in the Senate studying these issues. He's been running for president for a year and a half. So why does he have to look at a briefing book?
His advisers say that part of -- part of the challenge for them is to get that breadth of knowledge for -- that Senator Kerry has, and to condense it into a form that's usable in a debate format. He can't, as he would in the U.S. Senate, simply speak for as long as he wants to.
In this debate format, you have to speak in, really, sound bites that will carry forward in the evening news, the following days in the news, in the morning, and also just in a way that's digestible. He can't just go on and on forever. So part of the challenge is to get this breadth of knowledge and to condense it down into -- into a usable sound bite that they can put -- that he can use during this debate.
LIN: All right. Thanks very much, Frank. Frank Buckley, reporting live out of Wisconsin with the Kerry campaign.
Let's go out to the Mojave Desert out in California, where some news is being made. Miles O'Brien out there.
Hey, Miles.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Hey, Carol.
It looks like we're about just a few minutes away from the two space -- the two craft, I should say, the aircraft and the spacecraft, separating. They're at about 50,000 feet or so? Dick Rutan, with me now. Brother, Burt Rutan, the designer, builder of the craft.
DICK RUTAN, EXPERIMENTAL TEST PILOT: They've just done the final tracks. And everything is all on track, and they're about five minutes out.
O'BRIEN: About five minutes out now. And what will happen then, Carol, the two craft will separate.
We're trying to get a shot on our tracking cam. It's been hard to follow it, unfortunately.
The two will separate. And very quickly, Mike Melvill, the pilot of SpaceShipOne, will hit the button, light that rocket, and he will go -- that will burn for at least 65 seconds, maybe longer, until it reaches a certain altitude. And then he'll coast on up into the threshold of space.
He'll see the curvature of the Earth, the sky will get dark, things will start floating around his cabin. And if he does, in fact, make those altitude marks -- and that will all be verified by a series of instrumentation all around here, Edwards Air Force Base, radars, and so forth -- if, in fact, that is verified, this will be the first step toward winning that $10 million private cash purse, the Ansari X Prize.
We're just listening very close to the radios. And getting to the point now -- what's going on right now?
RUTAN: I think Mike is making the final control sweeps. And you use (ph) the stick around -- around the cockpit, and that's all fine. And one of the checks they just did is make sure that Mike has his seatbelt on. And so we double-checked that, too.
O'BRIEN: Well, you've always got to make sure you have the seatbelt on, no matter what.
RUTAN: When we're checking seatbelts, you know that they're getting close.
O'BRIEN: Yes. All right. Well, that's -- that means it could happen within the next couple of minutes... UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The winds are calm. You're clear to land.
RUTAN: OK. They just got landing clearance from the tower.
O'BRIEN: OK. So landing clearance from the tower, which you need to get before you actually go to space so that they have a clear hunk of airspace all the way coming in. SpaceShipOne is clear to land, already at Mojave Airport. And very shortly, the two should part company and off they will go.
Now, Mike Melvill, what's going through his mind now? He's pretty focused on the task at hand, right, Dick?
RUTAN: You bet. He's really focused right now to making sure that the last checks are done. And they're -- they're within a -- they're within a minute or so of launch.
O'BRIEN: Within a minute. Now, once the -- once the spaceship begins its ascent up, what is the hardest part of his job in keeping it pointed straight up?
RUTAN: What's going to happen, as soon as he -- as soon as he drops off, he's going to arm it and fire it. And there's about half a second delay, and then boom, he gets his 3G, eyeballs in, thrown against the seat. And then he has about a 4G pull to vertical flight.
O'BRIEN: All right. And through this period of time, is he on the radio talking usually, or is he just doing his job?
RUTAN: No, he will be talking a little bit.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: He's concentrating on what's going on.
O'BRIEN: All right. They just said "We're all ready here."
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There you go, Mike.
RUTAN: This is a big one.
O'BRIEN: As we wait for the radio call, Mike Melvill, talking to his fellow team members. And here we have our tracking camera shot.
This gives you a sense. They're way up there at 50,000 feet. There you see the White Knight, that gull-like craft right in the center of your screen. And beneath it is SpaceShipOne.
We should be able to see the two separate very shortly. And off SpaceShipOne will go.
A little bit later in the day, we'll get some pictures, which will be a lot closer. There's obviously cameras all over both aircraft, which will help us get a little better sense of what's going on there right now. But for now, this tracking camera gives us at least a glimpse on this beautiful, clear, high desert morning of ways going on way high above us. So high above us, we can't even hear the noise of the jet engines.
RUTAN: Two minutes.
O'BRIEN: Two minutes away. We will not even really hear the noise of the rocket either at this altitude, right?
RUTAN: No. If you listen very carefully, you can actually hear a sonic -- a little sonic boom as he goes. But the sonic boom is concentrated into space, not down to the ground.
O'BRIEN: And it's interesting, Carol, just a few minutes ago, while we were waiting here, the Earth quite literally moved. We had a little aftershock from that earthquake yesterday.
So just to add to the plot thickening here, not only are we seeing perhaps a rocket streaking through the sky, we've got a little shaky ground here, awaiting him on his return. There's a nice shot of that White Knight. And I believe right now -- is it on its way?
What are you hearing, Dick? Have they separated?
RUTAN: Somebody's messing with the frequency.
O'BRIEN: One minute mark right now, Carol. One minute away from separation, as we watch, as we look at this shot.
Bear with us there, as it's a little bit shaky, obviously. But you can see beneath there. You can almost make out the full SpaceShipOne, that small craft, carrying Mike Melvill, along with the equivalent weight of three passengers, which is required.
RUTAN: He's giving a go for launch.
O'BRIEN: Mike just gave a go for launch. Mike Melvill is go for launch.
RUTAN: OK. They're in the final countdown right now.
O'BRIEN: Final countdown. He said two yellow lights. What do...
RUTAN: Two yellow lights. They're ready for launch.
O'BRIEN: OK.
RUTAN: The launch...
O'BRIEN: We're going to just listen to the radio calls here for a moment. Dick, you listen with us.
O'BRIEN: Ten seconds away, 10 seconds away. OK, separation now.
Off they go. There's the rocket firing. Hopefully that camera will stay with it. Let's listen.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ten seconds. Twenty second. Go left.
O'BRIEN: Rock steady. It's rock steady.
RUTAN: OK, there's a little roll.
O'BRIEN: OK.
RUTAN: But he's got it under control.
O'BRIEN: What's causing that roll?
RUTAN: He's well into supersonic speed.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Doing OK? Copy that. OK. Coming up, 40 seconds.
O'BRIEN: Forty seconds into the rocket burn now. Heading straight up.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Super. Coming through, 45 seconds.-
O'BRIEN: A little bit of a roll there, Dick. What's going on?
RUTAN: He's well into supersonic flight.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: OK. A little roll -- I think he's making a heading curve.
O'BRIEN: Yes. Oh, boy, oh, boy, oh, boy. What's all that rolling all about?
RUTAN: It's a whole bunch of rolling. That's not good for him.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: Well, obviously, that's not what's been predicted. He's got a real right roll trim (ph) going.
O'BRIEN: He's going to shut down the engines now. And it's got a -- quite a distinct roll going on there. What's going on inside that spacecraft now?
RUTAN: Well, Mike is fighting to control that. OK. He's leaving the atmosphere.
OK. Now he's going to go and feather. And he's still going up, over 2,000 miles an hour, straight up.
O'BRIEN: What kind of G forces is he feeling now as he rolls on?
RUTAN: Now he's weightless.
O'BRIEN: He's weightless now.
RUTAN: The airplane is weightless.
O'BRIEN: But going around on that roll. And that's a hard thing to correct as you get beyond the atmosphere, correct?
RUTAN: Now he's using the reaction control system to try to fix that. Now it's coming up to feather. The airplane is in feather.
O'BRIEN: It looks like that roll has dampened quite a bit as they go into feather.
RUTAN: He's got it under control now.
O'BRIEN: That's not quite the ride he expected.
RUTAN: No, that's not the ride he expected. He had a little roll moment going on there. And I don't know what happened.
O'BRIEN: OK. Now that this has gone into this kind of shuttlecock mode, that has dampened out that -- that roll, and they're beginning the descent now.
RUTAN: No, he's still going up.
O'BRIEN: Is he still going up? OK.
RUTAN: We're going to hear it -- try and hear.
O'BRIEN: All right. Can you tell if he's coming down yet?
RUTAN: Yes, he should be on his way down now.
O'BRIEN: OK. Now, have you heard him talk much at all on the radio through all this?
RUTAN: Radar altitude is 358. They did it.
O'BRIEN: All right. They did it.
RUTAN: They broke the X-15 (ph).
O'BRIEN: The radar altitude -- it was a wild ride, Carol, what you saw there. That was an unbelievable ride, with -- who knows how many rolls he did. I mean, he was -- he was like...
RUTAN: He was really rolling, boy.
O'BRIEN: Rolling her -- her extra on an aerobatic mission.
RUTAN: But he was still going. He's still going straight up. So if they broke the 358, they broke the X-15 (ph) record.
O'BRIEN: What was -- I mean, how do you keep the thing pointed straight up when you're doing that kind of a roll? But that's...
RUTAN: I don't know. But the trajectory was good, but the roll is off. And we'll find out what happened later.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: But now he's reentering.
O'BRIEN: All right.
RUTAN: Now he's falling. And he's going to start entering the atmosphere here pretty quick.
O'BRIEN: All right. So what's going on right now inside there? And...
RUTAN: He's probably ended up in his weightless sign (ph), trying to pick up the outer fringes of the atmosphere as he's coming back right now.
O'BRIEN: All right. So 358,000 feet, in excess of 100 kilometers, the threshold of space. This all, of course, needs to be verified, Carol, by the judging team here. But that is a radar altitude, that's using some of the radar telemetry systems here.
Edwards Air Force Base is nearby. There's a lot of capability for getting a precise indication -- precise indication on exactly what altitude they reach.
But the indications on the radio here are that they did just that. And it was confirmed by radar.
As you can see, it drops like a shuttlecock. It's feathered, as they say, which means the wings are on a hinge, which allows it to...
RUTAN: It's 154,000, starting to reach the upper atmosphere. Now, within about another 15 seconds here, he would be up to five -- five Gs on the reentry.
O'BRIEN: So is the peak point of Gs...
RUTAN: This is coming up right now.
O'BRIEN: ... as he comes down, pulling as much as five Gs on its way down. At what point -- it's about 100,000 feet or so, or 80,000 feet, where they lock in that -- that wing and it begins...
RUTAN: Eighty thousand feet is the max G.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: And when that's over with, the G eases off, then he'll unfeather it. That's the next big event we're going to watch for right now.
O'BRIEN: You can see how it's kind of swiveled in the middle. It's almost on a hinge. Well, it is on a hinge.
And eventually, when it reaches that certain altitude, that hinge will be locked. And then it will operate once again as a glider. The beauty of this setup is that it allows so-called carefree reentry. In other words, aerodynamically, it is designed to come in at the right angle of descent, correct?
RUTAN: Seventy-one thousand feet. The Gs should be easing off right now.
O'BRIEN: OK.
LIN: Miles?
RUTAN: So we're -- OK, he's going to defeather. Now watch it real close, and he'll defeather. That's another big event.
O'BRIEN: OK.
RUTAN: OK, the RCS is off. That means he's (UNINTELLIGIBLE) control systems off.
O'BRIEN: All right. Let's -- I just want to explain a couple of things to our viewers.
You're seeing a lot of shakiness in this shot, and that is simply a function of the fact that you're looking through a telescope on a swivel mount designed to track this. It's not that we're having an earthquake out here.
It's just difficult...
RUTAN: Feathers locked.
O'BRIEN: It's very far away. The feathers are locked, the wings are locked. That means that this is now a functional glider, and Mike Melvill now needs to accomplish a dead stick landing. But really, the critical events have passed.
RUTAN: You bet. It's over. Critical events are over.
O'BRIEN: This is a guy who will -- he will grease this thing, I guarantee you. I'm sure he has enough energy to make it back here. You haven't heard anything to indicate otherwise?
RUTAN: No, he's in good shape.
LIN: Miles, what is a dead stick landing? Miles?
O'BRIEN: A dead stick landing means simply there's no -- no engine. Dead stick is a term that pilots use, indicating they've lost their engine. In this case, there is no engine.
He's just landing as a glider. And so he's got one shot. There's no go-around.
They have to be very careful about managing their energy and their altitude as they spiral downward toward the field here. You don't want to come up short, you don't want to land long either. So you just have to do that just right. He's practiced this so many times in simulators and the real thing, that this is a matter of routine for him.
LIN: So how does he control the direction then?
O'BRIEN: Well, it's -- you know, he's got -- he's got pulleys and wires. It's a very old-fashioned control system. It's the same control system Lindbergh used on the Spirit of St. Louis in 1927, just push rods and pulleys.
There's nothing very fancy about the controlling system on this SpaceShipOne. I think we just heard a sonic boom. Did we?
RUTAN: Yes. Yes, it could have been.
O'BRIEN: I think we just heard a sonic boom here, Carol.
LIN: Miles...
O'BRIEN: It's kind of exciting as he comes down here this beautiful day.
Yes, Carol?
LIN: Why not have an engine system to help him land more safely and more accurately?
O'BRIEN: Well, it's just a matter of weight. You need that rocket to get it up to space, and the additional weight of putting a couple of jet engines or a jet engine and the fuel that would be associated with that, that would mean you would have to make a bigger rocket, which in turn makes more weight. And you get into -- you know, you start chasing your tail on this.
So the idea is to use the weight for the fuel he required to get to space, do it in a way that you can glide back, which is precisely what the space shuttle does. It lands every time on a dead stick landing as well.
Little different craft, of course. A little bigger. But nevertheless, a glider landing.
And we're about how far away from landing, Dick, do you think?
RUTAN: He's coming under -- he's coming under about 38,000 feet.
O'BRIEN: Thirty-eight thousand feet, which means he's still got to spiral downward.
RUTAN: It's about 12 miles northeast of us right now.
O'BRIEN: Twelve miles. So you figure, what, within the next five minutes or so?
RUTAN: No, it will be another 15 minutes before he gets down. O'BRIEN: OK. It's going to be about 15 minutes before he touches down, Carol. If you want to step on to other things for a little bit, we can come back to this. And we'll make sure we come back to you for the touchdown on what appears to be the first successful attempt toward that X Prize, the second civilian ride into space here in Mojave -- Carol.
LIN: That's amazing, Miles. I mean, we were all holding our breath when we were watching, watching it roll.
O'BRIEN: Oh, boy, I'll tell you, yes. Watching that roll, I've got to tell you, that gets the heart going.
I don't know about you, Dick. What was going through your mind?
RUTAN: Well, I tell you what, I was worried about that, because that's not the way it was supposed to be. Thank goodness he still had a vertical trajectory when the roll started. So his altitude trajectory didn't get hurt, but it was probably a pretty good ride from his point of view.
O'BRIEN: Oh, I'm interested to hear. He wasn't planning on doing aerobatics today. That's all I can say, Carol. But he did some aerobatics, and I think he's just going to tell us quite a tale in a little while. And there's White Knight, by the way, coming in...
RUTAN: The most important thing, he really made it.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: I mean, they made the altitude and they got the first -- the first flight of the X Prize in the bag.
O'BRIEN: And no style points on this one. This is just a sheer, sheer case of making it. You can probably give him some extra style points for doing the rolls.
LIN: Hey, Miles...
RUTAN: Now, the thing is about Mike, here he went through all that gyrations, and here he is acting like a professional test pilot, going to recover this space vehicle.
O'BRIEN: Well, just listening to him on the radio, you would think it was nothing. Just another day in the office, Carol. These guys are amazing. They -- Tom Wolfe called it "The Right Stuff." He's got the stuff.
LIN: Yes. Talk about cool under pressure. Do you think he was able at all to appreciate the view from the top?
O'BRIEN: I suspect he had a moment there where things were floating. Or he might have been hyperventilating at that point, who knows? But I don't know. He was very cool.
RUTAN: No, Mike -- when things like that happen, Mike slows down and he deals with it. And I'm sure he dealt with it the best that he could. And we'll have to debrief and find out what happened.
O'BRIEN: Yes. You know, it's funny, Carol, last time when he got back, he talked about how it really was, quite frankly, scary. It was the kind of candor you don't often hear from astronauts.
And it will be interesting to hear what he says on the second go- around here. I'm sure that that was quite a -- quite a ride. And that onboard camera will give us quite an indication of what he was seeing as he was spinning like a cork headed upward. Kind of a corkscrew rotation.
RUTAN: Well, he had a pretty good role rate going.
O'BRIEN: Yes, you might say that.
LIN: Yes. How long, you figure, Miles, was he in a roll?
O'BRIEN: Oh, how long was that roll? My gosh, I would think a good hunk of the 60-second ascent was -- he was rolling. So...
RUTAN: Well, fortunately, he got the trajectory going vertical. And once he got it vertical, then he started rolling.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: And so then the height altitude wasn't compromised. Before, we hadn't got it going straight up and we had some problems. And that hurt the top altitude.
O'BRIEN: Yes. I'm hearing some laughter on the radio now as they talk about it. Obviously, they're glad to have gotten to this point -- Carol.
LIN: All right, Miles. So you figure another 10, 12 minutes before landing?
O'BRIEN: Yes. As soon as we see it getting close to landing here, we'll come back to you.
LIN: All right. Thanks, guys. Thanks, Miles.
O'BRIEN: All right.
LIN: All right. Just want to let you know, also, while we were watching those amazing pictures, we had some news coming in about Martha Stewart. It turns out the Bureau of Prisons, the Federal Bureau of Prisons has assigned her to spend her five-month sentence not in Danbury, Connecticut, but actually in Alderson, West Virginia.
It's a minimum security women's prison. About 1,000 inmates who are going to be sharing that prison with her.
Martha Stewart convicted of lying about her sale of ImClone stock. She said that she wants to start her prison sentence as soon as possible, even though she's appealing it. She just want to get the whole thing behind her. Hey, we're going to go back to the Mojave Desert. CNN's Miles O'Brien watching as SpaceShipOne tries to make landing.
RUTAN: So he's doing some final handling...
O'BRIEN: All right. They are -- here they are, they're testing it out. What are they doing on the checklist? Dick Rutan with us, by the way.
RUTAN: They're doing final handling qualities of the airplane to make sure they still have a good vehicle that's safe for landing. And everything looks good.
O'BRIEN: So all the control services are intact, despite all of those rolls we saw going up. Obviously built to withstand that kind of thing. But nevertheless, having gone through what he's going through, he's just focused right now on just getting on the ground nice and smooth and safe, huh?
RUTAN: It's called SOD, safe on deck.
O'BRIEN: Safe on deck is the goal right now.
As you see this, we should point out, there's a series of chase planes that are flying beside him right now. And that's not just to get pretty pictures. They're giving him information about his craft, right?
RUTAN: That's right. They're giving him a good look over to see that nothing has fallen off, or nothing is broken or cracked or anything. And I haven't heard anything to say that there's any problem.
O'BRIEN: There was a problem on the last flight in June. There was a bulk head that kind of collapsed on the way up.
RUTAN: Well, people made a big deal out of that, but it was just a little tiny aerodynamic (UNINTELLIGIBLE) who had really nothing to do with the structure or any part of it.
O'BRIEN: Right. Nevertheless, when things collapse, you want to make them so they don't collapse. And I assume that was...
RUTAN: Yes, it was just a little fearing (ph) that was kind of added at the last minute.
O'BRIEN: I see.
RUTAN: And it really wasn't any -- it was absolutely no significance whatsoever.
O'BRIEN: Now, as they go back and look at this flight, and look at the -- debrief him, they're going to obviously want to know why that roll occurred. What are the things they will, you know, systematically go down the list on? What will they look at? RUTAN: Well, they'll look and see where the controls were. See, they have a recording. They can record every control input that Mike has made, and then they can see the reaction for it.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: And they'll debrief him.
O'BRIEN: Looking at this tracking shot right now, by the way, which is courtesy of Dexter and Southfield schools, which brought their tracking facility for us, still, at about what altitude are we at right now?
RUTAN: He's probably coming through about 15,000.
O'BRIEN: Fifteen thousand feet. He's dropping pretty precipitously, right? The weight of descent is what?
RUTAN: Well, he can come down a lot faster, but it's about 4,000 feet a minute.
O'BRIEN: And just so you know, he's pretty much over our head, circling around. You don't want to get too far away from the -- you know, he just did another roll. And that was for fun, I guess.
RUTAN: That was for fun.
O'BRIEN: That was Mike Melvill being...
RUTAN: They call that a roll of val (ph) completed. That was the victory roll.
O'BRIEN: That was the victory roll, like he needed another roll today.
(LAUGHTER)
O'BRIEN: He's a little heavy on the rolls, Carol. Maybe we should give him -- put him on that low-carb diet.
RUTAN: Well, what he has to do is unwind it.
LIN: He's feeling pretty good.
O'BRIEN: And, you know, it's a funny thing. These test pilots, they just -- they don't stop, do they?
RUTAN: No, it's an air show.
O'BRIEN: It's an air show now. Well, it sure is an air show. We're all here, watching, aren't we?
All right. So we're about, what, five minutes away from landing?
RUTAN: Should be pretty close.
O'BRIEN: OK.
RUTAN: He can come down faster, but he may be up there just enjoying the day.
O'BRIEN: He may be enjoying the view and the day.
RUTAN: Well, he did a roll, so...
O'BRIEN: There you go, a victory roll, Carol. I mean, who would have predicted that one?
LIN: You know, they're just...
RUTAN: OK. Mike just gave his final checks. He's all ready to land.
O'BRIEN: All right. Final -- all right. Some sort of pressure light he's indicating. But he's going through those final landing checks right now -- Carol.
LIN: Hey, Miles, just for people who are starting to tune in right now, what's involved in this landing? You're saying there's no jet propulsion, he's basically flying on the wind.
O'BRIEN: Yes, it's -- it's -- just as a glider would -- glider pilot would handle it, you want to watch your altitude and your proximity to the airport. That's -- those are the basic two factors, how close you are, how high you are.
And you just want to make sure you judge those two things appropriately. You don't want to be too high and overshoot the runway, you don't want to be too low, and end up burrowing into the desert, hitting one of those endangered turtles they have out here. So you've got to be -- you've got to be very careful about that. And they basically have kind of a program which gives them a sense of where the altitude should be at any given moment.
RUTAN: That's right. It's a (UNINTELLIGIBLE) management thing, and it's a little blue line. As he turns, it's kind of in a circle. The end of it has a little dot, and that's where he's going to hit the ground. So what he does, he maneuvers the airplane to keep that dot on the end of the runway.
O'BRIEN: So, essentially, it projects out on a -- on a screen for him, a dot, which anticipates at any given moment where the craft would be if he kept doing what he's doing. And so if you keep the dot on the runway, in theory, that's where you'll end up, assuming everything works.
LIN: How fast is he going?
RUTAN: He just turned over to low chase.
O'BRIEN: I'm sorry.
LIN: How fast is he going? O'BRIEN: How fast would he be going right about now?
RUTAN: Oh, he's about 130 knots.
O'BRIEN: One hundred and thirty knots, so that would be, you know, 150 miles an hour, roughly. And he'll land at about what speed?
RUTAN: He'll touch down about 80 knots, or maybe just under 100 miles an hour. And they just reported that there's no buckling this time.
O'BRIEN: No buckling. We were talking about that faring (ph) that buckled at some point during the previous flight. They obviously reinforced that one.
So the chase planes are reporting back, giving everybody an indication of the state and welfare of SpaceShipOne as it comes down, right now, about 130 knots, 150 miles an hour. Bleed off a little more speed as it comes in.
And I can't see it from here. Have you been able to get your eyes on it, Dick, yourself? It looks like it's coming around pretty much right over us, still.
And in front of it there is one of the chase planes. I don't know which one that is. Can you tell who's beside him right now, Dick? Can you tell which chase plane is nearby?
RUTAN: It's the low chase.
O'BRIEN: So that would be the single engine extra, which is an aerobatic airplane. And he is right beside there, talking with Mike Melvill, as they go through their final checklist.
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CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Here's what's happening right "Now in the News."
The Department of Homeland Security is alerting Florida officials that tomorrow night's debate could be a potential target for terrorists. But officials say they have no specific intelligence or threat information suggesting the debate actually is a target.
And these are new images of British hostage Kenneth Bigley surfacing today on the Arab language network Al Jazeera. The videotape shows Bigley behind bars in what appears to be a cramped cell. Also, in another development, Bigley's brother tells CNN he has received an e-mail message suggesting his brother will be freed.
And a Yemeni court today sentenced two men to death for their role in the bombing of the USS Cole. Seventeen sailors died when suicide bombers attacked the ship using a boat laden with explosives. The October 2000 attack was linked to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network.
Dozens of North Koreans scaled the wall around the Canadian embassy in Beijing today in a daring bid for asylum. Forty-four people, including eight children, made it into the compound. One disabled man was stopped by an embassy guard. The refugees say they want to go to South Korea.
And up, up and away. Within the past hour, a plane carrying SpaceShipOne took off from the Mojave Desert on a $10 million quest. SpaceShipOne is trying to become the first privately-manned craft to fly into space twice in a two-week period. Our Miles O'Brien is there, and he's going to have a live update.
It's 11:00 a.m. on the East Coast, 8:00 a.m. out West. From the CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Carol Lin. Daryn has the day off today.
Up first on CNN, the presidential candidates get ready for their first face-to-face showdown. President Bush and Senator Kerry head to Florida on the eve of tomorrow night's debate.
National correspondent Frank Buckley is with the Kerry campaign, and he starts our coverage this hour from Dodgeville, Wisconsin -- Frank.
FRANK BUCKLEY, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi there, Carol.
No public event scheduled for Senator Kerry here today. He continues with his debate preparation. We're told that that's taken a number of forms, everything from watching videos of President Bush in past debate situations, to reading briefing papers, to just simply talking through the issues and engaging in mock debates.
While Senator Kerry continues in his debate prep mode, some of his advisers are now moving into the all-important spin mode. Important for setting expectations in advance of the debate, and very important after the debate, as well, because research has shown that many voters take their cues from that post-debate spin or analysis that they see on the TV news, and that's how they decide who has actually won the debate.
So some of the pre-debate spin taking place right now. Here's a taste of that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE LOCKHART, SR. ADVISER, KERRY CAMPAIGN: The debates in the modern political system are not won by the person who knows the most information. They're won by the people who are most persuasive for their position. And George Bush has proved time and time again that he is a very persuasive debater.
It does, of course, seem at times like he doesn't have all the facts straight. But he seems to do it in a way that gives you a sense of commitment and a sense of what direction he wants to go in. And, you know, every debate he's been in, he's won.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BUCKLEY: For Senator Kerry's part, his aides say that he has to demonstrate strength in leadership qualities and offer a choice to voters as they move forward and make their decision on the election. Senator Kerry today will continue his prep mode, debate prep mode here in Wisconsin, and board a plane this afternoon. And he'll arrive in Florida tonight -- Carol.
LIN: Frank, John Kerry has a reputation for knowing the issues absolutely cold. He's a classical debater. So why does he have to spend so much time preparing with these briefing books?
BUCKLEY: It's a great question. He has spent 20 years in the Senate studying these issues. He's been running for president for a year and a half. So why does he have to look at a briefing book?
His advisers say that part of -- part of the challenge for them is to get that breadth of knowledge for -- that Senator Kerry has, and to condense it into a form that's usable in a debate format. He can't, as he would in the U.S. Senate, simply speak for as long as he wants to.
In this debate format, you have to speak in, really, sound bites that will carry forward in the evening news, the following days in the news, in the morning, and also just in a way that's digestible. He can't just go on and on forever. So part of the challenge is to get this breadth of knowledge and to condense it down into -- into a usable sound bite that they can put -- that he can use during this debate.
LIN: All right. Thanks very much, Frank. Frank Buckley, reporting live out of Wisconsin with the Kerry campaign.
Let's go out to the Mojave Desert out in California, where some news is being made. Miles O'Brien out there.
Hey, Miles.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Hey, Carol.
It looks like we're about just a few minutes away from the two space -- the two craft, I should say, the aircraft and the spacecraft, separating. They're at about 50,000 feet or so? Dick Rutan, with me now. Brother, Burt Rutan, the designer, builder of the craft.
DICK RUTAN, EXPERIMENTAL TEST PILOT: They've just done the final tracks. And everything is all on track, and they're about five minutes out.
O'BRIEN: About five minutes out now. And what will happen then, Carol, the two craft will separate.
We're trying to get a shot on our tracking cam. It's been hard to follow it, unfortunately.
The two will separate. And very quickly, Mike Melvill, the pilot of SpaceShipOne, will hit the button, light that rocket, and he will go -- that will burn for at least 65 seconds, maybe longer, until it reaches a certain altitude. And then he'll coast on up into the threshold of space.
He'll see the curvature of the Earth, the sky will get dark, things will start floating around his cabin. And if he does, in fact, make those altitude marks -- and that will all be verified by a series of instrumentation all around here, Edwards Air Force Base, radars, and so forth -- if, in fact, that is verified, this will be the first step toward winning that $10 million private cash purse, the Ansari X Prize.
We're just listening very close to the radios. And getting to the point now -- what's going on right now?
RUTAN: I think Mike is making the final control sweeps. And you use (ph) the stick around -- around the cockpit, and that's all fine. And one of the checks they just did is make sure that Mike has his seatbelt on. And so we double-checked that, too.
O'BRIEN: Well, you've always got to make sure you have the seatbelt on, no matter what.
RUTAN: When we're checking seatbelts, you know that they're getting close.
O'BRIEN: Yes. All right. Well, that's -- that means it could happen within the next couple of minutes... UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The winds are calm. You're clear to land.
RUTAN: OK. They just got landing clearance from the tower.
O'BRIEN: OK. So landing clearance from the tower, which you need to get before you actually go to space so that they have a clear hunk of airspace all the way coming in. SpaceShipOne is clear to land, already at Mojave Airport. And very shortly, the two should part company and off they will go.
Now, Mike Melvill, what's going through his mind now? He's pretty focused on the task at hand, right, Dick?
RUTAN: You bet. He's really focused right now to making sure that the last checks are done. And they're -- they're within a -- they're within a minute or so of launch.
O'BRIEN: Within a minute. Now, once the -- once the spaceship begins its ascent up, what is the hardest part of his job in keeping it pointed straight up?
RUTAN: What's going to happen, as soon as he -- as soon as he drops off, he's going to arm it and fire it. And there's about half a second delay, and then boom, he gets his 3G, eyeballs in, thrown against the seat. And then he has about a 4G pull to vertical flight.
O'BRIEN: All right. And through this period of time, is he on the radio talking usually, or is he just doing his job?
RUTAN: No, he will be talking a little bit.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: He's concentrating on what's going on.
O'BRIEN: All right. They just said "We're all ready here."
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There you go, Mike.
RUTAN: This is a big one.
O'BRIEN: As we wait for the radio call, Mike Melvill, talking to his fellow team members. And here we have our tracking camera shot.
This gives you a sense. They're way up there at 50,000 feet. There you see the White Knight, that gull-like craft right in the center of your screen. And beneath it is SpaceShipOne.
We should be able to see the two separate very shortly. And off SpaceShipOne will go.
A little bit later in the day, we'll get some pictures, which will be a lot closer. There's obviously cameras all over both aircraft, which will help us get a little better sense of what's going on there right now. But for now, this tracking camera gives us at least a glimpse on this beautiful, clear, high desert morning of ways going on way high above us. So high above us, we can't even hear the noise of the jet engines.
RUTAN: Two minutes.
O'BRIEN: Two minutes away. We will not even really hear the noise of the rocket either at this altitude, right?
RUTAN: No. If you listen very carefully, you can actually hear a sonic -- a little sonic boom as he goes. But the sonic boom is concentrated into space, not down to the ground.
O'BRIEN: And it's interesting, Carol, just a few minutes ago, while we were waiting here, the Earth quite literally moved. We had a little aftershock from that earthquake yesterday.
So just to add to the plot thickening here, not only are we seeing perhaps a rocket streaking through the sky, we've got a little shaky ground here, awaiting him on his return. There's a nice shot of that White Knight. And I believe right now -- is it on its way?
What are you hearing, Dick? Have they separated?
RUTAN: Somebody's messing with the frequency.
O'BRIEN: One minute mark right now, Carol. One minute away from separation, as we watch, as we look at this shot.
Bear with us there, as it's a little bit shaky, obviously. But you can see beneath there. You can almost make out the full SpaceShipOne, that small craft, carrying Mike Melvill, along with the equivalent weight of three passengers, which is required.
RUTAN: He's giving a go for launch.
O'BRIEN: Mike just gave a go for launch. Mike Melvill is go for launch.
RUTAN: OK. They're in the final countdown right now.
O'BRIEN: Final countdown. He said two yellow lights. What do...
RUTAN: Two yellow lights. They're ready for launch.
O'BRIEN: OK.
RUTAN: The launch...
O'BRIEN: We're going to just listen to the radio calls here for a moment. Dick, you listen with us.
O'BRIEN: Ten seconds away, 10 seconds away. OK, separation now.
Off they go. There's the rocket firing. Hopefully that camera will stay with it. Let's listen.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ten seconds. Twenty second. Go left.
O'BRIEN: Rock steady. It's rock steady.
RUTAN: OK, there's a little roll.
O'BRIEN: OK.
RUTAN: But he's got it under control.
O'BRIEN: What's causing that roll?
RUTAN: He's well into supersonic speed.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Doing OK? Copy that. OK. Coming up, 40 seconds.
O'BRIEN: Forty seconds into the rocket burn now. Heading straight up.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Super. Coming through, 45 seconds.-
O'BRIEN: A little bit of a roll there, Dick. What's going on?
RUTAN: He's well into supersonic flight.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: OK. A little roll -- I think he's making a heading curve.
O'BRIEN: Yes. Oh, boy, oh, boy, oh, boy. What's all that rolling all about?
RUTAN: It's a whole bunch of rolling. That's not good for him.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: Well, obviously, that's not what's been predicted. He's got a real right roll trim (ph) going.
O'BRIEN: He's going to shut down the engines now. And it's got a -- quite a distinct roll going on there. What's going on inside that spacecraft now?
RUTAN: Well, Mike is fighting to control that. OK. He's leaving the atmosphere.
OK. Now he's going to go and feather. And he's still going up, over 2,000 miles an hour, straight up.
O'BRIEN: What kind of G forces is he feeling now as he rolls on?
RUTAN: Now he's weightless.
O'BRIEN: He's weightless now.
RUTAN: The airplane is weightless.
O'BRIEN: But going around on that roll. And that's a hard thing to correct as you get beyond the atmosphere, correct?
RUTAN: Now he's using the reaction control system to try to fix that. Now it's coming up to feather. The airplane is in feather.
O'BRIEN: It looks like that roll has dampened quite a bit as they go into feather.
RUTAN: He's got it under control now.
O'BRIEN: That's not quite the ride he expected.
RUTAN: No, that's not the ride he expected. He had a little roll moment going on there. And I don't know what happened.
O'BRIEN: OK. Now that this has gone into this kind of shuttlecock mode, that has dampened out that -- that roll, and they're beginning the descent now.
RUTAN: No, he's still going up.
O'BRIEN: Is he still going up? OK.
RUTAN: We're going to hear it -- try and hear.
O'BRIEN: All right. Can you tell if he's coming down yet?
RUTAN: Yes, he should be on his way down now.
O'BRIEN: OK. Now, have you heard him talk much at all on the radio through all this?
RUTAN: Radar altitude is 358. They did it.
O'BRIEN: All right. They did it.
RUTAN: They broke the X-15 (ph).
O'BRIEN: The radar altitude -- it was a wild ride, Carol, what you saw there. That was an unbelievable ride, with -- who knows how many rolls he did. I mean, he was -- he was like...
RUTAN: He was really rolling, boy.
O'BRIEN: Rolling her -- her extra on an aerobatic mission.
RUTAN: But he was still going. He's still going straight up. So if they broke the 358, they broke the X-15 (ph) record.
O'BRIEN: What was -- I mean, how do you keep the thing pointed straight up when you're doing that kind of a roll? But that's...
RUTAN: I don't know. But the trajectory was good, but the roll is off. And we'll find out what happened later.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: But now he's reentering.
O'BRIEN: All right.
RUTAN: Now he's falling. And he's going to start entering the atmosphere here pretty quick.
O'BRIEN: All right. So what's going on right now inside there? And...
RUTAN: He's probably ended up in his weightless sign (ph), trying to pick up the outer fringes of the atmosphere as he's coming back right now.
O'BRIEN: All right. So 358,000 feet, in excess of 100 kilometers, the threshold of space. This all, of course, needs to be verified, Carol, by the judging team here. But that is a radar altitude, that's using some of the radar telemetry systems here.
Edwards Air Force Base is nearby. There's a lot of capability for getting a precise indication -- precise indication on exactly what altitude they reach.
But the indications on the radio here are that they did just that. And it was confirmed by radar.
As you can see, it drops like a shuttlecock. It's feathered, as they say, which means the wings are on a hinge, which allows it to...
RUTAN: It's 154,000, starting to reach the upper atmosphere. Now, within about another 15 seconds here, he would be up to five -- five Gs on the reentry.
O'BRIEN: So is the peak point of Gs...
RUTAN: This is coming up right now.
O'BRIEN: ... as he comes down, pulling as much as five Gs on its way down. At what point -- it's about 100,000 feet or so, or 80,000 feet, where they lock in that -- that wing and it begins...
RUTAN: Eighty thousand feet is the max G.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: And when that's over with, the G eases off, then he'll unfeather it. That's the next big event we're going to watch for right now.
O'BRIEN: You can see how it's kind of swiveled in the middle. It's almost on a hinge. Well, it is on a hinge.
And eventually, when it reaches that certain altitude, that hinge will be locked. And then it will operate once again as a glider. The beauty of this setup is that it allows so-called carefree reentry. In other words, aerodynamically, it is designed to come in at the right angle of descent, correct?
RUTAN: Seventy-one thousand feet. The Gs should be easing off right now.
O'BRIEN: OK.
LIN: Miles?
RUTAN: So we're -- OK, he's going to defeather. Now watch it real close, and he'll defeather. That's another big event.
O'BRIEN: OK.
RUTAN: OK, the RCS is off. That means he's (UNINTELLIGIBLE) control systems off.
O'BRIEN: All right. Let's -- I just want to explain a couple of things to our viewers.
You're seeing a lot of shakiness in this shot, and that is simply a function of the fact that you're looking through a telescope on a swivel mount designed to track this. It's not that we're having an earthquake out here.
It's just difficult...
RUTAN: Feathers locked.
O'BRIEN: It's very far away. The feathers are locked, the wings are locked. That means that this is now a functional glider, and Mike Melvill now needs to accomplish a dead stick landing. But really, the critical events have passed.
RUTAN: You bet. It's over. Critical events are over.
O'BRIEN: This is a guy who will -- he will grease this thing, I guarantee you. I'm sure he has enough energy to make it back here. You haven't heard anything to indicate otherwise?
RUTAN: No, he's in good shape.
LIN: Miles, what is a dead stick landing? Miles?
O'BRIEN: A dead stick landing means simply there's no -- no engine. Dead stick is a term that pilots use, indicating they've lost their engine. In this case, there is no engine.
He's just landing as a glider. And so he's got one shot. There's no go-around.
They have to be very careful about managing their energy and their altitude as they spiral downward toward the field here. You don't want to come up short, you don't want to land long either. So you just have to do that just right. He's practiced this so many times in simulators and the real thing, that this is a matter of routine for him.
LIN: So how does he control the direction then?
O'BRIEN: Well, it's -- you know, he's got -- he's got pulleys and wires. It's a very old-fashioned control system. It's the same control system Lindbergh used on the Spirit of St. Louis in 1927, just push rods and pulleys.
There's nothing very fancy about the controlling system on this SpaceShipOne. I think we just heard a sonic boom. Did we?
RUTAN: Yes. Yes, it could have been.
O'BRIEN: I think we just heard a sonic boom here, Carol.
LIN: Miles...
O'BRIEN: It's kind of exciting as he comes down here this beautiful day.
Yes, Carol?
LIN: Why not have an engine system to help him land more safely and more accurately?
O'BRIEN: Well, it's just a matter of weight. You need that rocket to get it up to space, and the additional weight of putting a couple of jet engines or a jet engine and the fuel that would be associated with that, that would mean you would have to make a bigger rocket, which in turn makes more weight. And you get into -- you know, you start chasing your tail on this.
So the idea is to use the weight for the fuel he required to get to space, do it in a way that you can glide back, which is precisely what the space shuttle does. It lands every time on a dead stick landing as well.
Little different craft, of course. A little bigger. But nevertheless, a glider landing.
And we're about how far away from landing, Dick, do you think?
RUTAN: He's coming under -- he's coming under about 38,000 feet.
O'BRIEN: Thirty-eight thousand feet, which means he's still got to spiral downward.
RUTAN: It's about 12 miles northeast of us right now.
O'BRIEN: Twelve miles. So you figure, what, within the next five minutes or so?
RUTAN: No, it will be another 15 minutes before he gets down. O'BRIEN: OK. It's going to be about 15 minutes before he touches down, Carol. If you want to step on to other things for a little bit, we can come back to this. And we'll make sure we come back to you for the touchdown on what appears to be the first successful attempt toward that X Prize, the second civilian ride into space here in Mojave -- Carol.
LIN: That's amazing, Miles. I mean, we were all holding our breath when we were watching, watching it roll.
O'BRIEN: Oh, boy, I'll tell you, yes. Watching that roll, I've got to tell you, that gets the heart going.
I don't know about you, Dick. What was going through your mind?
RUTAN: Well, I tell you what, I was worried about that, because that's not the way it was supposed to be. Thank goodness he still had a vertical trajectory when the roll started. So his altitude trajectory didn't get hurt, but it was probably a pretty good ride from his point of view.
O'BRIEN: Oh, I'm interested to hear. He wasn't planning on doing aerobatics today. That's all I can say, Carol. But he did some aerobatics, and I think he's just going to tell us quite a tale in a little while. And there's White Knight, by the way, coming in...
RUTAN: The most important thing, he really made it.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: I mean, they made the altitude and they got the first -- the first flight of the X Prize in the bag.
O'BRIEN: And no style points on this one. This is just a sheer, sheer case of making it. You can probably give him some extra style points for doing the rolls.
LIN: Hey, Miles...
RUTAN: Now, the thing is about Mike, here he went through all that gyrations, and here he is acting like a professional test pilot, going to recover this space vehicle.
O'BRIEN: Well, just listening to him on the radio, you would think it was nothing. Just another day in the office, Carol. These guys are amazing. They -- Tom Wolfe called it "The Right Stuff." He's got the stuff.
LIN: Yes. Talk about cool under pressure. Do you think he was able at all to appreciate the view from the top?
O'BRIEN: I suspect he had a moment there where things were floating. Or he might have been hyperventilating at that point, who knows? But I don't know. He was very cool.
RUTAN: No, Mike -- when things like that happen, Mike slows down and he deals with it. And I'm sure he dealt with it the best that he could. And we'll have to debrief and find out what happened.
O'BRIEN: Yes. You know, it's funny, Carol, last time when he got back, he talked about how it really was, quite frankly, scary. It was the kind of candor you don't often hear from astronauts.
And it will be interesting to hear what he says on the second go- around here. I'm sure that that was quite a -- quite a ride. And that onboard camera will give us quite an indication of what he was seeing as he was spinning like a cork headed upward. Kind of a corkscrew rotation.
RUTAN: Well, he had a pretty good role rate going.
O'BRIEN: Yes, you might say that.
LIN: Yes. How long, you figure, Miles, was he in a roll?
O'BRIEN: Oh, how long was that roll? My gosh, I would think a good hunk of the 60-second ascent was -- he was rolling. So...
RUTAN: Well, fortunately, he got the trajectory going vertical. And once he got it vertical, then he started rolling.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: And so then the height altitude wasn't compromised. Before, we hadn't got it going straight up and we had some problems. And that hurt the top altitude.
O'BRIEN: Yes. I'm hearing some laughter on the radio now as they talk about it. Obviously, they're glad to have gotten to this point -- Carol.
LIN: All right, Miles. So you figure another 10, 12 minutes before landing?
O'BRIEN: Yes. As soon as we see it getting close to landing here, we'll come back to you.
LIN: All right. Thanks, guys. Thanks, Miles.
O'BRIEN: All right.
LIN: All right. Just want to let you know, also, while we were watching those amazing pictures, we had some news coming in about Martha Stewart. It turns out the Bureau of Prisons, the Federal Bureau of Prisons has assigned her to spend her five-month sentence not in Danbury, Connecticut, but actually in Alderson, West Virginia.
It's a minimum security women's prison. About 1,000 inmates who are going to be sharing that prison with her.
Martha Stewart convicted of lying about her sale of ImClone stock. She said that she wants to start her prison sentence as soon as possible, even though she's appealing it. She just want to get the whole thing behind her. Hey, we're going to go back to the Mojave Desert. CNN's Miles O'Brien watching as SpaceShipOne tries to make landing.
RUTAN: So he's doing some final handling...
O'BRIEN: All right. They are -- here they are, they're testing it out. What are they doing on the checklist? Dick Rutan with us, by the way.
RUTAN: They're doing final handling qualities of the airplane to make sure they still have a good vehicle that's safe for landing. And everything looks good.
O'BRIEN: So all the control services are intact, despite all of those rolls we saw going up. Obviously built to withstand that kind of thing. But nevertheless, having gone through what he's going through, he's just focused right now on just getting on the ground nice and smooth and safe, huh?
RUTAN: It's called SOD, safe on deck.
O'BRIEN: Safe on deck is the goal right now.
As you see this, we should point out, there's a series of chase planes that are flying beside him right now. And that's not just to get pretty pictures. They're giving him information about his craft, right?
RUTAN: That's right. They're giving him a good look over to see that nothing has fallen off, or nothing is broken or cracked or anything. And I haven't heard anything to say that there's any problem.
O'BRIEN: There was a problem on the last flight in June. There was a bulk head that kind of collapsed on the way up.
RUTAN: Well, people made a big deal out of that, but it was just a little tiny aerodynamic (UNINTELLIGIBLE) who had really nothing to do with the structure or any part of it.
O'BRIEN: Right. Nevertheless, when things collapse, you want to make them so they don't collapse. And I assume that was...
RUTAN: Yes, it was just a little fearing (ph) that was kind of added at the last minute.
O'BRIEN: I see.
RUTAN: And it really wasn't any -- it was absolutely no significance whatsoever.
O'BRIEN: Now, as they go back and look at this flight, and look at the -- debrief him, they're going to obviously want to know why that roll occurred. What are the things they will, you know, systematically go down the list on? What will they look at? RUTAN: Well, they'll look and see where the controls were. See, they have a recording. They can record every control input that Mike has made, and then they can see the reaction for it.
O'BRIEN: Yes.
RUTAN: And they'll debrief him.
O'BRIEN: Looking at this tracking shot right now, by the way, which is courtesy of Dexter and Southfield schools, which brought their tracking facility for us, still, at about what altitude are we at right now?
RUTAN: He's probably coming through about 15,000.
O'BRIEN: Fifteen thousand feet. He's dropping pretty precipitously, right? The weight of descent is what?
RUTAN: Well, he can come down a lot faster, but it's about 4,000 feet a minute.
O'BRIEN: And just so you know, he's pretty much over our head, circling around. You don't want to get too far away from the -- you know, he just did another roll. And that was for fun, I guess.
RUTAN: That was for fun.
O'BRIEN: That was Mike Melvill being...
RUTAN: They call that a roll of val (ph) completed. That was the victory roll.
O'BRIEN: That was the victory roll, like he needed another roll today.
(LAUGHTER)
O'BRIEN: He's a little heavy on the rolls, Carol. Maybe we should give him -- put him on that low-carb diet.
RUTAN: Well, what he has to do is unwind it.
LIN: He's feeling pretty good.
O'BRIEN: And, you know, it's a funny thing. These test pilots, they just -- they don't stop, do they?
RUTAN: No, it's an air show.
O'BRIEN: It's an air show now. Well, it sure is an air show. We're all here, watching, aren't we?
All right. So we're about, what, five minutes away from landing?
RUTAN: Should be pretty close.
O'BRIEN: OK.
RUTAN: He can come down faster, but he may be up there just enjoying the day.
O'BRIEN: He may be enjoying the view and the day.
RUTAN: Well, he did a roll, so...
O'BRIEN: There you go, a victory roll, Carol. I mean, who would have predicted that one?
LIN: You know, they're just...
RUTAN: OK. Mike just gave his final checks. He's all ready to land.
O'BRIEN: All right. Final -- all right. Some sort of pressure light he's indicating. But he's going through those final landing checks right now -- Carol.
LIN: Hey, Miles, just for people who are starting to tune in right now, what's involved in this landing? You're saying there's no jet propulsion, he's basically flying on the wind.
O'BRIEN: Yes, it's -- it's -- just as a glider would -- glider pilot would handle it, you want to watch your altitude and your proximity to the airport. That's -- those are the basic two factors, how close you are, how high you are.
And you just want to make sure you judge those two things appropriately. You don't want to be too high and overshoot the runway, you don't want to be too low, and end up burrowing into the desert, hitting one of those endangered turtles they have out here. So you've got to be -- you've got to be very careful about that. And they basically have kind of a program which gives them a sense of where the altitude should be at any given moment.
RUTAN: That's right. It's a (UNINTELLIGIBLE) management thing, and it's a little blue line. As he turns, it's kind of in a circle. The end of it has a little dot, and that's where he's going to hit the ground. So what he does, he maneuvers the airplane to keep that dot on the end of the runway.
O'BRIEN: So, essentially, it projects out on a -- on a screen for him, a dot, which anticipates at any given moment where the craft would be if he kept doing what he's doing. And so if you keep the dot on the runway, in theory, that's where you'll end up, assuming everything works.
LIN: How fast is he going?
RUTAN: He just turned over to low chase.
O'BRIEN: I'm sorry.
LIN: How fast is he going? O'BRIEN: How fast would he be going right about now?
RUTAN: Oh, he's about 130 knots.
O'BRIEN: One hundred and thirty knots, so that would be, you know, 150 miles an hour, roughly. And he'll land at about what speed?
RUTAN: He'll touch down about 80 knots, or maybe just under 100 miles an hour. And they just reported that there's no buckling this time.
O'BRIEN: No buckling. We were talking about that faring (ph) that buckled at some point during the previous flight. They obviously reinforced that one.
So the chase planes are reporting back, giving everybody an indication of the state and welfare of SpaceShipOne as it comes down, right now, about 130 knots, 150 miles an hour. Bleed off a little more speed as it comes in.
And I can't see it from here. Have you been able to get your eyes on it, Dick, yourself? It looks like it's coming around pretty much right over us, still.
And in front of it there is one of the chase planes. I don't know which one that is. Can you tell who's beside him right now, Dick? Can you tell which chase plane is nearby?
RUTAN: It's the low chase.
O'BRIEN: So that would be the single engine extra, which is an aerobatic airplane. And he is right beside there, talking with Mike Melvill, as they go through their final checklist.
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