FYI,

"Virgin Galactic Strikes Deal with Swedish Government"
SPACE.com
http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20070128/sc_space/virgingalacticstrikes
dealwithswedishgovernment

: The Swedish government on Jan. 26 announced an agreement with
: suborbital space-tourism company Virgin Galactic that Swedish
: officials believe will lead to midsummer and mid-winter flights of
: Virgin's SpaceshipTwo vehicle to observe the Aurora Borealis from
: Sweden.

: The agreement, signed at the proposed future launch site in
: Kiruna, Sweden, calls for no exchange of funds. Swedish officials
: say the Kiruna facility, already known for launching suborbital
: sounding rockets and atmospheric balloons, has sufficient
: infrastructure to accommodate Virgin Galactic and that no new
: investment is needed.

: Norberg said in a Jan. 26 interview that the Swedish government
: also will take charge of the technology-export approvals needed to
: export SpaceshipTwo and related hardware to Sweden during flight
: campaigns.

: As a demonstration of its interest, Esrange authorities have
: proposed to launch a small sounding rocket in March 2008 into the
: Aurora Borealis.

: Equipped with cameras, the flight would serve two purposes. It
: would give prospective passengers a sense of what they will view
: from their windows aboard SpaceshipTwo, and it will give
: SpaceshipTwo designer Burt Rutan and his company, Scaled
: Composites, a sense of what effect, if any, the Northern Lights
: might have on both the passengers and the electronics gear carried
: by SpaceshipTwo.

: "Apparently this has never been done before, to fly through the
: Aurora Borealis," Norberg said. "We have images from above and
: below, but we have never taken pictures from within."

: Norberg told SPACE.com that the public interest in human
: spaceflight in Sweden peaked in December with NASA's successful
: STS-116 mission to the International Space Station. Sweden's first
: astronaut, Christer Fuglesang, represented the European Space
: Agency on the STS-116 crew and performed three of the mission's
: four spacewalks.

: "It was a complete space craze here in Sweden. Christer's flight
: was reported on a minute-by-minute basis," Norberg said. "We're in
: a very good movement where the people's interest is really
: peaking, and we'll be able to use that kind of atmosphere."

: Fuglesang received a hero's welcome this week after returning to
: Sweden, where he is expected to dine with King Carl XVI Gustaf and
: Queen Silvia tonight.

: "So people are really fascinated by spaceflight," Norberg said.

Mark Reiff