American entrepreneur
Jim Benson, founder of the aerospace firm SpaceDev that helped build the rocket
engine that launched the world's first privately-built manned spaceship into
suborbital space, died early Friday of a brain tumor, the company announced today.
Benson died
in his sleep from a glioblastoma multiforme brain tumor, which he was diagnosed
with last year, SpaceDev officials said. He was 63.
"Jim
was a true
visionary," said Mark Sirangelo, SpaceDev's CEO and Chairman of the
Board. "He saw that space exploration could be more effective if done
commercially, and formed SpaceDev to make that dream become a reality."
Benson founded
the Poway, Calif.-based SpaceDev in 1997 after 30 years working in the computer
industry.
In 2003,
the firm won a contract to provide key elements of the hybrid rocket engine for
SpaceShipOne, a piloted reusable suborbital spacecraft built by aerospace
pioneer Burt Rutan and his firm Scaled Composites in Mojave, Calif. After a
successful June 2004 demonstration flight, SpaceShipOne went on to win the
$10 million Ansari X Prize by flying twice in two weeks later that year.
"Our
motor performed flawlessly during that flight," a proud Benson told SPACE.com
in September 2004.
Benson earned
a Bachelors of Science degree in geology from the University of Missouri in his
hometown of Kansas City. He invented modern full text computer indexing and
searching in 1984. He founded the companies Compusearch and ImageFast of
McLean, Va., to tap into those fields.
SpaceDev
officials said Benson later founded the space-oriented company to combine his
interests in science, technology and astronomy.
"I
want to go into space," Benson said in May 2007 at International Space Development
Conference (ISDC) in Dallas, Texas. "It's been 52 years. I'm tired of
waiting."
At times, Benson
seemed at odds with Rutan over the credit for SpaceShipOne's novel engine and
its performance. After the spaceship's first successful flight in June 2004,
Benson lauded the success and told SPACE.com that the next flight would
feature an upgraded version of the nitrous-oxide and rubber-burning engine. In
a swift interview response, Rutan proclaimed there were no
upgrades, simply extra propellant.
But Benson's
passion for spaceflight never wavered and he unveiled SpaceDev's plans to build
the DreamChaser spaceship in 2004. In 2006, he stepped down from an
operational role in SpaceDev and founded the Benson Space Company, a space
tourism venture.
Benson is
survived by his wife Susan, three children and four grandchildren. His family is
planning a memorial service later in the year.
"He will be
missed by many but his legacy contained in SpaceDev will continue to forward
his vision for the commercialization of space," Sirangelo said.
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