The first privately built and piloted vehicle to reach space has been donated to the Smithsonian’s National Air & Space Museum. The official turnover of SpaceShipOne takes place Oct. 5. NASM plans to hang it in the museum’s Milestones gallery, next to Chuck Yeager’s Bell X-1 and Charles Lindbergh’s “Spirit of St. Louis.”
Senior U.S. military officials involved in restructuring the troubled LGM-35A Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile program now project confidence that it will achieve operational capability in the early 2030s.