$1 million rocket prize awarded to Mojave firm

By ALLISON GATLIN
Valley Press Staff Writer

The six-person Mojave-based company had already won a $150,000 second-place prize in the first phase of the Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge, managed by the X Prize Foundation as part of the NASA Centennial Challenges program, before being named the winner of the second phase.

"The Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge has had its intended impact, with impressive performances by multiple teams representing a new generation of aerospace entrepreneurs" said Andrew Petro, NASA's Centennial Challenge program manager at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "These companies have demonstrated reusable vehicles with rapid turnaround and a surprising degree of precision in flight, and they have done all this at a much lower cost than many thought possible."

With the competition period ending Sunday, NASA and X Prize Foundation officials announced the winners Monday. The prizes will be awarded Thursday during ceremonies in Washington, D.C.

With $1.15 million in winnings, Masten beat out Texas-based Armadillo Aerospace for the largest prize purse, as the two teams combined for the competition's entire $2 million in prizes.

Armadillo won the $350,000 Level 1 first-place prize last year and the $500,000 Level 2 second-place prize with a qualifying flight on Sept. 12.

Masten CEO David Masten said he looks forward to a continuing private space race among the Lunar Lander Challenge competitors.

"To come from not flying at all last year to qualifying for Level 1 and Level 2 of the LLC this year shows how far our technology has progressed," he said. "We are now working on flying to higher altitudes and speeds with Xoie. From there, we will begin working on Xoie's successor, which will be capable of reaching up to the edge of space."

Masten said the competition was a great success, and the private space industry is much stronger for it.

"Reusable rocket technologies have been demonstrated by several teams on budgets that are a small fraction of a normal NASA program," he said.

Both levels of the competition required teams to build rockets that could take off vertically, climb to 50 meters (about 164 feet), land on a pad 50 meters away, then repeat the feat within 135 minutes.

The Level 1 competition required the rocket to remain aloft for 90 seconds, while the more difficult Level 2 required twice as much time aloft and also required landing on one pad strewn with rocks and craters to simulate the lunar surface.

Ultimately, Masten's landing accuracy made the difference in the more difficult Level 2 race.

According to the challenge rules, if more than one team successfully completed the required flights, the one that landed closest to the center of the target was declared the winner.

In the unofficial results, Masten's rocket - nicknamed Xoie - landings were an average of 19 centimeters, or about seven inches, off the center of the target.

Armadillo Aerospace's landing accuracy was an average of 89 centimeters, or 35 inches.

"We are all very excited to have David Masten and John Carmack take the top prizes in the 2009 Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander X Prize Challenge. It is an honor to award these teams $2 million in prize money," said Dr. Peter H. Diamandis, chairman and CEO of the X Prize Foundation. "This space race was exciting to watch and experience, as these dedicated teams raced to advance space technology. It is clear that the emerging space industry will continue to benefit from the Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander X Prize Challenge."

Masten first qualified for the $150,000 Level 1 second prize on Oct. 7 with the successful flights of its Xombie rocket vehicle.

The million-dollar flight came after attempts on Oct. 28 and 29 were thwarted, first by a communication glitch between the ground control station and the onboard flight computer, then by wiring damage from a small fire caused by a fuel tank leak upon landing after the first of the two required flights.

Competition officials granted the team a final opportunity on the morning of Oct. 30.

Masten Space Systems' win came with controversy. Armadillo Aerospace's John Carmack lodged a protest over the judges' unanimous decision to allow Masten a third day to attempt the flights.

Carmack said while he didn't hold it against Masten for taking advantage of the opportunity offered, he felt it was a mistake on the judges' part.

"I recognize that it is in the best interests of both the NASA Centennial Challenges department and the X-Prize Foundation to award all the prize money this year, and that will likely have indirect benefits for us all in coming years," Carmack wrote. "It is probably also beneficial to the nascent New Space industry to get more money to Masten than Armadillo, since we have other resources to draw upon.

"Permit me to be petty enough to be upset and bitter about a half-million dollars being taken from me and given to my competitor.

"The rules have given the judges the discretion to do just about anything up to and including awarding prize money for best effort if they felt it necessary, so there may not be any grounds to challenge this, but I do feel that we have been robbed," he said.

Both Masten Space Systems and Armadillo Aerospace are using the challenge as a steppingstone to their larger goals of creating launchers to go into suborbital space.

agatlin@avpress.com