By Wes Oleszewski

Mojave airport has seen its share of events and crowds in the past. The people come, gather, watch some piece of aviation history play itself out and then they leave. Life at the airfield then returns to its abnormal normality.  But the week of the X Prize attempt is something different. This time there are to be two historic events taking place with a slim four-day gap in between and Mojave would hardly have time to catch its breath.

The first storm of press, spectators and sponsors began on Tuesday and ended late Wednesday, reaching its peak with the successful flight of SpaceShipOne.

Once the last headline had been written and the final TV journalist had posed for the final segment of video, things slipped back into the normal routine at the desert airport. At the base of the old control tower the Voyager Restaurant went back to serving food to normal sized groups of airport employees and occasional visitors. Down the flightline a bit, the folks at XCOR went back to work on their plans, funding proposals and the hardware needed to launch future space tourists. Elsewhere on the field a DC-10 is towed into place for the purpose of salvaging parts. Scaled Composites' people roll out Proteus and fire up its engines for another high altitude mission.

Yet, even with all of this routine activity, Mojave is only resting in the calm between two storms. The moment that the gear of SpaceShipOne contacted the runway, the 14 day X Prize clock began to tick and the second storm began approaching. The SpaceShipOne team actually narrowed the gap between the events when they announced that their attempt to finish the race for the X Prize would take place just four days after their vehicle's latest flight.

Now the Mojave airport remains poised for the next onslaught of spectators and press. On the ramp, white tents wait empty and X Prize parking signs have been left in place with nothing more than blowing dust to direct. Golf carts and moving vans rest and staff tables are idle in the hangar that is designated as temporary headquarters for the X Prize staff. A pallet stacked with unopened event programs sits silently and coolers recently filled with ice and cold drinks has become a shallow pool upon which a few discarded items float. This is the calm, the space between the events that make history. This is the forgotten pause that eats up squares on the calendar and is the dividing line between dates that some future history students will have to memorize.

In just a few hours the storm will begin again only next time it will be stronger and larger. The impression that this leg of the SpaceShipOne mission schedule will be the one that claims the grand prize will no doubt bring out throngs of spectators and media who would otherwise not bother making the desert venture. The crushed blacktop and sandy field parking lots will be weighed down with vehicles of every sort and countless camera lenses will point toward the heavens.

At the end of the day, in the glow of success or the vacuum of failure a press conference will be held and the inevitable dumb questions will be asked. When it is all over and the last reporter has sat for the final few feet of video tape, things will slip back into their normal routine at the desert airport called Mojave.

FMI: www.scaled.com, www.mojaveairport.com