Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo Crashes in Mojave. One Pilot Dead. Rough Week For Commercial Spaceflight.

One pilot was killed and
another was injured today in a crash during a test
flight of Virgin Galactic’s space tourism craft, SpaceShipTwo.
SpaceShipTwo was lost. The jet that carried the ship aloft,
WhiteKnightTwo, is fine. This was the 55th test flight for
SpaceShipTwo and the 35th for WhiteKnightTwo.

Paired with the explosion of the
NASA/Orbital Sciences Antares rocket on Tuesday, it’s been a
rough week for commericial spaceflight.

Not to get all “Dubious
News Hook Lets Me Confirm and Blog My Preexisting Views,” but
human deaths have a way of attracting the attention of regulators,
and this
point from Rand Simberg in Reason‘s February 2012
space-themed issue is worth keeping in mind: Risk is part of
innovation, and we should let people continue to put their lives on
the line if they do so with full understanding of those risks.

[Good space policy requires] smarter regulation to encourage
entrepreneurship and accept risk. For instance, current law
prevents the Federal Aviation Administration’s Office of Space
Transportation (FAA-AST) from regulating the safety of passengers
aboard spacecraft; it is constrained to regulating only those
issues that affect uninvolved third parties.

The hand of the state has rested lightly on the space industry
so far, thanks to that 2004 law, which imposed an eight-year
moratorium on regulation. The view at the time was that until
private space passenger vehicles actually took flight, the industry
was too poorly understood to intelligently regulate. The moratorium
is about to expire, and the House is willing to extend it to cover
another eight years after flights begin. But the Senate is
resisting the extension, demanding stricter regulation while
simultaneously seeking to cut the budget of the FAA-AST. If the
stalemate continues, the industry could wind up regulated out of
existence before it even gets off the ground.

This FAA policy was hard won and may now be in jeopardy if
politicians get in the mood to Do Something.