Chang, Kenneth. "Virgin Galactic Is Rattled, but Undeterred, by Deadly Space Plane Crash." The New York Times. The New York Times, 01 Nov. 2014. Web. 04 Dec. 2014.
This article is about a company called Virgin Galactic and the crash that occurred during one of their test flights. Virgin Galactic is a company whose goal is to take normal people into space. About 700 people, like celebrities Justin Bieber, Brad Pitt and Katy Perry, have already reserved seats, at the price of 250,000. But with this crash comes a great setback. On Friday morning a test flight, set out in the Mojave Desert to test a new motor that had been installed recently. After about 20 miles from where it had departed, SpaceShipTwo broke up and created a path of debris that was five miles long, showing it had blown up in space. The pilot parachuted out safely but the 39 year old co-pilot died. The final report on the accident, will take a year and until then the company cannot send anyone into space. Richard Branson, the billionaire entrepreneur who started Virgin Galactic said, “We are determined to find out what went wrong.” The problem is thought to be the new motor, instead of having been made from rubber, it was made from plastic, and this proves to be a big problem. The start of commercial flights, had already been delayed to years later than what was desired, and it will certainly be delayed again because Virgin Galactic faces a difficult decision about the motor that will be used for the next SpaceShipTwo. The company has three choices, it could stick with this design that already has killed one person, it could go back to a design that had been successful except for the fact that it couldn’t go high enough for the “weightlessness sensation” or it could switch to a new design, which would take years of development and testing. So right now the company is having difficult choices to make but, Mr. Branson said, “In the early days of aviation, there were incidents, and then aviation became very safe.”
This article is relevant and important to society because, if celebrities have the ability to go to space in a few years, than it could possibly mean that “normal” people could go experience space at a reasonable price in just a few more years. This is important because by seeing how people react when in near space, the space industry like NASA, could make progresses how to make a space mission best for the astronauts. This would mean that Richard Branson’s goal of taking tourists on short flights into space, would be achieved.
This article was well written because the writer used a clear style of writing. The fact that there was many inputs from Richard Branson, helped understand what had happened during and after the crash. In addition, while reading we didn’t get the feeling of being overwhelmed because of the simplicity and organized way of the writing. Even though the article was in general well written, the fact that the author talked about the crash first and then the events that had happened before, was a bit confusing. So, if he had ordered the events in a more chronological order, the article would have flowed more nicely. However, overall the article was complete and didn’t leave you feeling like you had many questions left unanswered in the end.
Chang, Kenneth. "Virgin Galactic Is Rattled, but Undeterred, by Deadly Space Plane Crash." The New York Times. The New York Times, 01 Nov. 2014. Web. 04 Dec. 2014.
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I read Chloes response to the article on the crash of the virgin galactic plane. She did a great job explaining the purpose of this aircraft and the pressure the company is under to do well. She also provided great detail on what the cause of the crash could have been. Another thing that Chloe did well was to give examples of what is going to happen to the future of this style of aircraft. I would like to know more about how this aircraft works and how it is different from a regular shuttle, if she could include more information about those things they would be helpful. I was overall very impressed with the detail she provided in her response, and she did a great job of giving her response flow and organization.
After reading Chloe’s review I felt that her analysis was very well presented, leaving very little to be desired. I liked that she opened her review somewhat broadly but narrowed down on the specific subject in the next few sentences. In addition her frequent use of quotes greatly added to the review. Finally Chloe’s use of exact numbers in her review instead of “more than twenty” or “almost a thousand”, also played a key role in her review.
ReplyDeleteIf I were to suggest any changes in Chloe’s review I would suggest she talk more about the Virgin Galactic company because most-likely people reading her review won't know who or what Virgin Galactic is and their goals are for space travel. I would also suggest explaining the author’s “clear style of writing” rather than just stating he has one.
As I was reading the article i was extremely surprised to read that “About 700 people” have already signed on to Virgin Galactic flights despite the incident with their rocket. I want to go into space but I would like to do it as safe as possible and I don't understand why people are already signing on for a ticket on one of their rocket/planes.