Beech Starship? SpaceShipOne?

"DunxC" wrote in message
...
Hi,

I watched the fantastic coverage of SpaceShipOne's historic flight
yesterday
and was truly impressed. I've long thought of Burt Rutan as the last of
the
pioneers, and this one cements it.

He is definitely an original. One of the greatest, no doubt.

However, did I really see a Beech Starship
flying past also?

Yes. Unique, classy plane.

I though Beech (or parent company) had withdrawn these.

Apparently it was owned by Scaled Composites, one of their company planes.

Anyone know what it was up to?

It was serving as a chase plane/camera plane for the mission and the filming
for a Discovery Channel special on the mission. There were a couple other
chase/camera planes as well, but the Starship took off and formed up with
the White Knight/Spaceship One combo plane early on.

TIA Duncan

NP brah.