Brian Binnie Joins XCOR as Senior Test Pilot
Brian Binnie
Mojave, CA, April 3, 2014 (XCOR PR) – XCOR Aerospace announced today that celebrated aviator, test pilot, engineer and commercial astronaut Brian Binnie has joined the company as Senior Test Pilot.
As Senior Test Pilot, Binnie will be working with another celebrated pilot and astronaut, XCOR Chief Test Pilot and former Space Shuttle Pilot and Commander, US Air Force Colonel (Ret.) Richard (Rick) Searfoss.
“Brian and I have been friends and colleagues for many years and I have always wanted to work together in a flying environment,” noted Searfoss. “Combining our backgrounds as government and commercial astronauts and our broad experience across a number of rocket powered craft, I feel this builds on XCOR’s strong culture that emphasizes safety and professionalism.”
“Brian, Dan DeLong and I worked together at Rotary Rocket,” said XCOR Founder and CEO Jeff Greason. “He was a consummate professional and leader there, and we’ve stayed in close contact over the years, so I know he will make a great contribution to our efforts at XCOR and getting the Lynx flying soon.”
“I’m very pleased to be part of the XCOR Team and look forward to working with friends and colleagues on many of the exciting development efforts at XCOR including the family of Lynx vehicles,” noted Binnie, “I look forward to seeing the Lynx flying soon and making a contribution to the program.”
Brian Binnie is a decorated aviator having piloted the Ansari X-Prize award winning flight that broke the winged aircraft altitude record previously held by the X-15. He also was the pilot of a unique prototype of a single stage to orbit system, the Roton Rocket Atmospheric Test Vehicle, from Rotary Rocket. Binnie has over 5300 hours of flight time in 85 different aircraft types and 29 years experience as a test pilot. A former Naval Aviator, he is a retired Commander having flown the A-7 Corsair, the A-6 Intruder, the F/A-18 Hornet and the AV-8B Harrier. He is a 1988 Graduate of the United States Naval Test Pilot School, received his Bachelors in Aerospace Engineering and Masters in Thermodynamics from Brown University and received a second Masters Degree in Aeronautical Engineering from Princeton University.
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XCOR Aerospace: XCOR Aerospace is based in Mojave, California. It is currently creating a Research and Development Center in Midland, Texas, and will be establishing an operational and manufacturing site at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. XCOR builds safe, reliable and reusable rocket-powered vehicles, propulsion systems, advanced non-flammable composites and rocket piston pumps. XCOR works with aerospace prime contractors and government customers on major propulsion systems, while also building Lynx. Lynx is a piloted, two-seat, fully reusable liquid rocket-powered vehicle that takes off and lands horizontally. The Lynx family of vehicles serves three primary missions depending on their specific type including: research and scientific missions, private spaceflight and micro satellite launch (only on the Lynx Mark III). Lynx production models (designated Lynx Mark II) are designed to be robust, multi-mission (research/scientific or private spaceflight) commercial vehicles capable of flying to 100+ km in altitude, up to four times per day. Lynx vehicles are available to customers in the free world on a wet lease basis to start their own manned space flight program. Learn more at www.xcor.com.
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6 responses to “Brian Binnie Joins XCOR as Senior Test Pilot”
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Congrats!!! After all you have achieved you don’t deserve to take a back seat!!! I wish you all thethe best!
Perhaps this is a sign of the issues currently besetting VG.
I see nobody wants to discuss one interesting Binnie’s accomplishment: crashing SpaceShipOne. Reportedly Mike Mellville raised voice at him, accusing Brian of “flying it into runway”, and swore to show him how it’s done (and did!). Binnie was later promoted to management, which was a win-win-win for everyone: kept him out of cockpit and trouble, used his considerable leadership talents, and probably increased his pay. At some point he penned an article (in Salon, IIRC), which was supposed to introspect. It left a poor impression on me. Of course we all saw self-whitewash videos on Youtuble when someone stalls and wheelbarrows an LSA. It’s typical for pilots, maybe people in general. But even if Binnie could not handle SS1, he is still a 1000 times better pilot than I am. He’s supposed to hold himself to a higher standard instead of posting excuses in Salon. I hope Jeff knows what he’s doing.
P.S. Really the issue here is not the crash, but his odd reaction to it. Hopefuly the different environment will let him to restart, if he has it in him.
P.P.S. It’s strange that he’s going to report to Rick, which should see him doing actual flying, but he’s “looking forward to seeing Lynx fly” instead of looking forward to flying it. It’s going to be very strange if his boss were to do actual flying. I hope we’ll see soon enough how that turns out.
CAVU for Brian! We all look forward to seeing the first commercial flights in the Lynx. Just remember, if you’re not sitting up front with the pilot, you’re only a half-astronaut.
Seriously? I wonder what all the NASA Mission Specialist astronauts think about that last sentence! If I get to go into space in SS2 and am not actually piloting it then I would rather ride in the back, float around, and marvel at the view.
This may not be an appropriate question, but i still keep wondering. How can companies like XCOR and VG afford to keep full time test pilots on payroll, with almost no flights actually happening ? At this stage of business, i would probably just hire pilots on contract when needed, with a long term MOU.