“With regard to the article by David Whitehouse posted Friday, 18 April, 2003, 13:45 GMT 14:45 UK: Does anyone actually read these BBC stories before they are posted? It would be polite to to spell Mr. Rutan’s name properly (‘Burt’ not ‘Bert’). Moreover, this is not the ‘world’s first manned sub-orbital space programme’. I cannot imagine that Burt Rutan would have ever referred to his new project as the BBC says he did…” Cowling

—BBC Screws Up AgainNASA Watch)

This site appears to be an activist website focusing on NASA. Apparently Mr. Cowling has had past dealings with the BBC reporter whose story he criticizes above. The BBC story has apparently been silently corrected. Tissy-fits and snarkiness aside, this is yet another case of a reporter getting the facts wrong, which is why students should put extra effort into finding peer-reviewed journal articles instead of trusting whatever comes up on Google. Via Daily Dish.