Man in the News: Burt Rutan, rocket man
By Matthew Garrahan
Published: December 11 2009 23:17 | Last updated: December 11 2009 23:17
On a freezing evening in the Mojave desert this week, 800 people huddled under a swaying plastic tent to see the man hailed as the pre-eminent genius of the aerospace industry unveil his latest creation.
As storm clouds darkened the sky, howling winds battered the tent, to the obvious alarm of some guests. But Burt Rutan, the engineering brains behind the Virgin Space Ship Enterprise, the craft Sir Richard Branson hopes will soon be taking paying passengers into space, barely noticed.
Mr Rutan has lived for many years in Mojave, 100 miles north of Los Angeles. His ruddy, craggy face is familiar with the punishing gales that pummel the desert, while his impressive pair of bushy, mutton chop-sized sideburns lend the 66-year-old the air of an eccentric scientist.
He may be eccentric – he lives in a pyramid-shaped house in the desert and owned a parrot able to mimic a dog and a cat – but his achievements leave rival aerospace engineers in the shade. He designed Voyager, which in 1986 completed the first non-stop round the world flight on a single tank of fuel. His next project, SpaceShipOne, was funded by Paul Allen, the billionaire co-founder of Microsoft, and won the $10m Ansari X-Prize when in 2004 it became the first privately-financed craft to complete – and repeat – a sub-orbital flight.
“He is beyond legendary,” says Tig Krekel, the former chief executive of Hughes Space and Communications, and a friend of Mr Rutan’s for the past 15 years. “He’s up there with the Wright brothers.”
The Enterprise, the successor to the SpaceShipOne programme, is Mr Rutan’s most ambitious project. With Sir Richard now on board, the aim is to turn manned, sub-orbital flights into a commercial reality. Enterprise can carry six passengers, each of whom will have paid $200,000 for a two-hour journey to sub-orbital space and back. Sir Richard’s Virgin Galactic group hopes to begin regular manned flights within two years, yet without Mr Rutan the prospects for commercial space-flights would be considerably dimmer.
Like the detachable craft used in SpaceShipOne, Enterprise has wings that pivot to the earth, allowing it to drop at great speed upon re-entering the atmosphere. He took his inspiration for the design from a badminton shuttlecock and the way its feathers create drag, slowing its fall. Although he has been in thrall to space travel for most of his life, an early inspiration was Wernher von Braun, the pioneering German rocket scientist, whom he saw in a film with Walt Disney in the 1950s.
Born in Oregon, Mr Rutan was raised in Dinuba, a town in California’s Central Valley. His father was a dentist but he also had a pilot’s licence and owned a small plane. Burt and his brother, Dick, would both become accomplished pilots but it was Burt who developed a fascination with aerodynamic design and engineering.
As a young boy, he would ask his mother to drive the family car faster so he could test the effects of the rushing air on his latest model plane as he held it out of the window. Later, when studying at California State Polytechnic University, he constructed his own miniature wind tunnel which he fixed to the roof of his 1966 Dodge Dart to fine-tune his designs.
He uses his engineering nous to solve problems. In the 1980s he built a three-storey, pyramid shaped home in Mojave. “He designed it himself,” says Doug Shane, vice president of Scaled Composites, the group founded by Mr Rutan – and a test pilot for SpaceShipOne. “He wanted a more energy-efficient house.”
Mr Rutan has also applied analytical thinking to the golf course to improve his ability on the greens. “He is a horrible putter,” says Mr Krekel, who often plays golf with him. “So he designed a uniquely shaped composite putter. It didn’t make him any better but he thought it did. Burt takes an analytical approach to golf just as he does with engineering. He has an ability to come at problems from different directions, which is why three of his aircraft are hanging in the Smithsonian.”
He has been married four times – a friend told a 2004 New Yorker interview that his current wife was “the best one he’s ever had” – and he tends to start each day with a rousing rendition of James Brown’s “I Feel Good”.
“Burt is plain-talking, direct and he has a great sense of humour,” says Robert Weiss, president of the X-Prize Foundation. “He can also be very charming – and he looks a lot like Wolverine’s dad.”
Like the X-Men character he resembles, he has an intensity that manifests itself in his political views. A libertarian, he has no patience with government meddling in private enterprise and is dismayed at the waste in America’s official space programme. “He understands space projects need to be regulated but doesn’t think governments should regulate every aspect of life,” says Will Whitehorn, president of Virgin Galactic.
Climate change is another source of contention. While he has built an energy efficient house and was one of the first to drive an electric car, he is unconvinced by the link between global warming and man-made emissions. “He’s not a climate-change denier, he just doesn’t think the science is necessarily right,” says another friend. “He’s big on conspiracy theories.”
Yet he takes great pride in America. “When a military jet flies overhead and makes a lot of noise, Burt will look up and say: ‘That’s the sound of freedom’,” says Mr Krekel.
His life has not been without tragedy. In 2007, three employees were killed and three seriously injured at an accident at his test facility in Mojave. For the safety-conscious Mr Rutan, the incident was hard to take. He also suffered health problems, having open heart surgery last year. Yet he still gave a spirited performance on stage in Mojave this week, appearing alongside Sir Richard, Arnold Schwarzenegger, governor of California, and Bill Richardson, governor of New Mexico.
His passion for commercial space travel still burns, friends say. “One of the seminal moments for me was shortly after he won the X-Prize,” says Sir Richard. “We were at Burt’s pyramid house for dinner with Paul Allen and Will Whitehorn and he laid out his vision for Space Ship Two. And then he laid out his vision for getting to Mars before any government.”
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