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STUC-X001

X-Prize Cup

An artist's conception of a future X-Prize Cup festival.

The first-ever X Prize Cup, a follow-up to last year's Ansari X-Prize $10 million sub-orbital space race, occurred during a four-day event, October 6-9, 2005 at the Las Cruces, New Mexico airport. Because the Space Tourism Industry is in its infancy, this year the festival was strictly an exposition and exhibition operating under the Federal Aviation Administration’s rules for experimental aircraft so there were no space-launch competitions to take place. There were liftoffs, takeoffs and rocket demonstrations, during the event aimed at setting the stage for future contests in the years to come.

Planned highlights of this year's X-Prize Cup event included:

• Armadillo Aerospace would launch a small-scale version of its vertical-takeoff, vertical-landing sub-orbital spacecraft. The vehicle was built specifically for this event to demonstrate the hovering capability of the vehicle they have under development.
• Both the da Vinci Project and Rocketplane Ltd. would show off mockups and real hardware of their spacecraft. Company representatives of the two business said they planned to begin test flights next year and intended to compete in future X-Prize Cup races.
• Starchaser Industries, which recently set up headquarters in New Mexico, would conduct a test firing of the type of rocket engine that could be used on its sub-orbital vehicle as early as next year. A mockup of Starchaser's crew capsule would also be open for public tours.
• XCOR Aerospace brought its rocket-powered EZ-Rocket plane for a series of demonstration flights to highlight the technology to go into the spacecraft they have in work.

New Mexico eventually plans to develop a Southwest Regional Spaceport near Las Cruces, supported by $9 million in state funds set aside for the project, for both future X-Prize Cup events and Space Tourism flights. 

The event's organizers also conducted a variety of educational events. On Oct. 7th, students from the area converged on the New Mexico Museum for Space History in Alamagordo, New Mexico, for activities related to rocketry, robotics, astronomy and life sciences. The next day, the museum presented a full schedule of family activities as part of "X-Prize Day."

Many of the companies scheduled to participate in the X-Prize Cup event took part in the Ansari X-Prize competition as well. Scaled Composites, LLC which actually won the prize was noticeably absent having retired SpaceShipOne which was installed in the Washington, D.C. Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum less than two weeks before the X-Prize Cup began.

Event organizers are saying this year's New Mexico festival would show that SpaceShipOne's builders weren't the only players in the new sub-orbital space race for Space Tourism.

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Last modified: April 24, 2012