I was a bit surprised late last week to see an AP article that quoted Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta as saying that he expected commercial space tourism to commence from the US by 2008. Not because Mineta didn’t say it—I was in the room at the FAA’s Commercial Space Transportation Conference Thursday morning when he uttered that remark—but because that seem that newsworthy. After all, space tourism operators like Virgin Galactic and Rocketplane have been on record for months that they plan to start carrying passengers by 2008, if not sooner. Why would the AP focus on that comment? Because, it turned out, the Department of Transportation itself issued a press release highlighting that comment in Mineta’s speech (the text of which is also available.) Well, at least we’re all clear on the timeline now.
