Via Space Today, there is a press conference next Tuesday to make some announcements regarding X Prize developments. More than likely this will be Rutan's official announcement. Brian Feeney of the Da Vinci Project will also be there. Let's hope he also announces a prize shot. Nothing like a little competition to rev up the ratings.

I haven't been following DaVinci, and a quick glance at their site doesn't show much recent information. Are they likely to be in a position to announce a try? I mean, it'd be nice, but...

I don't have any inside info, but from what I've seen, it is an extreme longshot. As far as I can see, they haven't had ANY test flights of the full system. I hope they are careful - I'd hate to see them push too hard and lose someone.

On the other hand, I think it would be fantastic if some groups in other countries had some success. It would be good for them, and would help to push things here.

Da Vinci's design is a little hard to do incremental testing on because of the balloon launch. They've checked out the things that can be checked out without a test drop, AFAIK. It's interesting that both of the leading contenders chose air launch and hybrid propulsion, though if you're doing air launch I think that airplanes beat balloons from the standpoint of ease of recovery.

Da Vinci has been in this since the beginning (not registered as an official team, but working on their basic concept). They've got a lot of hard work behind them, so it's conceivable that they might be able to pull ahead at the last second.

All the latest news on DaVinci here:
http://www.xprizenews.org/index.php?cat=10

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