Alan Boyle has another dispatch from Mojave, about XCOR and Masten. I’ll have a piece on that subject (and the rollout) at PM later today.

I’ve been thinking about it, and this can’t be good for VG. They invite a lot of high-falutin’ people, including a lot of wealthy customers, subject them first to chilling winds and cold to see the vehicle, then have them party in a cold tent with iced vodka, after checking their coats and valuables. Then they quickly herd them outside in subfreezing temperatures and hurricane-force winds without their coats and other things, waiting in the chill blast for buses, shortly after which the tent collapses. Many of them are only now starting to get their belongings back, which were scattered across the desert and probably stopped only by the east fence of the airport. And Burt is saying “I told you so”:

…we drive past Schwarzenegger’s private jet as it taxis along the runway. It has been held on the ground for two hours because the wind was too strong to take off. Moments later we pass the party tent, which has now been reduced to a pile of tarpaulin and twisted metal. “I told them it was a bad idea to hold the event in this weather,” says Rutan.

Throwing a party isn’t rocket science, and it’s supposed to be something in Sir Richard’s wheel house. I wonder how many “future astronauts” had their faith shaken in the company’s ability to fly them safely?

Alan Boyle has the story of yesterday’s…events. And yes, baby, it was cold outside.

[Update a few minutes later]

Clark Lindsey has a lot more links.

Man, is it cold up here. I can barely type, and even the laptop is running slow.

I was going to live blog the press conference, but my computer wouldn’t even boot until I found some power for it. We watched the plane(s) roll out, emerging from the darkness into floodlights, with searchlights dancing on dissipating (perhaps only temporarily) clouds above the cold desert sky. The wind was blowing at gale force, and cutting right through, with the temps probably in the lower thirties.

More later, after I warm my fingers up. But it may be much later…

[Update a few minutes later, at 7:40 PM]

The party was supposed to go until 9, but they’re evacuating the tent before the wind blows it down.

[Late evening update]

For those of you on the edge of your seats wondering if the tent collapsed on me, I got out before the wind blew it down, and we retired to the Mariah Hotel bar (but tonight, they could have called the wind Mariah, as the old song goes). I just got in from the drive back down to LA. More on the morrow.

On the eve of the rollout of SpaceShipTwo in Mojave tomorrow, Popular Science has a look at the new companies that will get the rest of us into space.