>>>>Dude.
>>>>
>>>>That's pathetic. Dick Rutan's private Spaceship One goes 5 times that high. We had balloons going to those heights 60 years ago but we didn't attach freeze-dried teddy bears to them.
>>>>
>>>>When will Britain/ESA grow a real space program? By the time Europe gets to the moon they'll land at a Chinese terminal with American restaurants, Russian taxis, and Indian hotels.
>>>>
>>>>>http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1091896/British-bears-space-Schoolchildrens-teddies-pictured-19-miles-Earth-strapped-giant-weather-balloon.html
>>>
>>>Been there - done that!
>>>http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A430903
>>
>>The lack of government support for this was a real shame. With a few millions invested we could have had a very effective space program employing UK engineers and science students. They're always happy to chuck money at things like opera though.
>
>Tell me about it! And yet "developing" countries like India can go for it.
>
>We produce stuff, invent stuff, develop stuff, then the govt always gets tight-fisted and drops projects or sells/gives them away.
>
>I'm still smarting from handing over the Harrier jump jet, one of the best aviation inventions in history, to the US.

We did even worse with the Avro Arrow, which at the time, was ahead of its time. We didn't sell it at all (well, unless you count selling the destroyed planes to a junk dealer for 6.5 cents a pound). We destroyed the planes, and all the drawings, plans etc. as if it never existed. It was a weird event in Canadian aviation history.

>
>WHY? FGS!
>
>BTW at least one of the satellites sent up from the Br space proj is still circling the earth and is detectable.