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"The Telegraph can disclose that Sir Richard’s company, as well as US authorities, were warned about safety issues on numerous occasions, as long ago as 2007 when three engineers died in an explosion during testing of a rocket engine on the ground.

"Carolynne Campbell, the lead expert on rocket propulsion at the International Association for the Advancement of Space Safety (IAASS), said: “This explosion is not a surprise. None whatsoever, I am sorry to say. It is exactly what I was expecting. It was Russian roulette which test flight blew up.”

"She had first warned Virgin Galactic about the danger of its nitrous oxide-propelled engines in the aftermath of the 2007 disaster, and has repeated those warnings since.

"In a study published in 2010 on her website and sent to Sir Richard’s company as well as to the US authorities, she wrote: “We are not confident that … we yet know enough about N2O [nitrous oxide] to consider it a safe oxidiser for use in passenger flight. "

And plenty more.

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/science042014.php#branson-virgin-galactic-021114

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a grave misunderstanding of 'science'

Charles Moore on Green alarmism:

“The theory of global warming is a gigantic weather forecast for a century or more. However interesting the scientific inquiries involved, therefore, it can have almost no value as a prediction. Yet it is as a prediction that global warming has captured the political and bureaucratic elites. All the action plans, taxes, green levies, protocols and carbon-emitting flights to massive summit meetings, after all, are not because of what its supporters call “The Science”. Proper science studies what is – which is, in principle, knowable – and is consequently very cautious about the future – which isn’t. No, they are the result of a belief that something big and bad is going to hit us one of these days.”

Charles Moore may as well say that an asteroid on a collision path to Earth is 'only' a prediction.

Well yes, it just may be diverted by another asteroid, or it may break up in the atmosphere, but only a complete fool would not dive for the bomb shelter.

Further, AGW has very little in common with 'a giant weather forecast'. The methods and 'science' are, in fact, different.

Not all predictions/probabilities are equal, so the quote is yet another example of poor education in the UK and the lack of scientific understanding abroad in the culture.

related material
global warming
cause, chance and Bayesian statistics

[Lead from Guido Fawkes]

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/science042014.php#science_misunderstanding_080414

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