This apparently happened earlier last month, but the Armadillo Aerospace (JC's rocket company) only updated it's blog yesterday. The company (if you didn't know) has entered the X-Prize Cup's $2m Lunar Lander competiton - They almost won it last year, but technical probs with the landing gear stopped them. They are the front runners to win this this year - but they suffered a setback when one of the 'quads' they fly went out in a ball of flame. Texel crash, Pixel back-to-back 180minute flights, Module 105 minute flight There's movies of the crash in that link, along with movies of the sister quad doing back to back winning duration flights & of the new modular rockets that they're building I think they're still a shoe in for this - nobody else in the competition has come close to replicating the capability of the AA vehicals, and the mysterious, un-named 9th competitor has pulled out... I love these guys. They seem to have a blast (no pun intended) doing this, and really seem to be getting somewhere with there build it, fly it, crash it approach. Besides - their rockets land the way rockets are supposed to land. Tail first, on a plume of flame!
