Spaceman Mike is ‘proudly South African’

By Steve Matthewson

MIKE Melvill, the South Africanborn pilot of the world’s first privately funded space mission this week, says a part of him remains proudly South African and he still has strong ties to the country despite the fact that he left here almost 25 years ago.

In an interview with the Herald from California, where he has lived and worked since 1978, test pilot and aeronautics industry executive Mr Melvill, 63, talked about his close links with South Africa and his passion for the country.

“South Africa is still the most beautiful country in the world,” he said. “My mom and dad were also born there so I am a second generation South African.” Mr Melvill still visits his family in South Africa and stays in contact with many old friends, although he visited more frequently before his mother died in 1995.

His sister, Rosemary “Bunny” Melvill, still lives in Durban and is a hospital theatre matron. He has cousins in Johannesburg and Cape Town and he sends Christmas cards and newspaper clippings to his aunt, Maya Melvill, who lives in an East London old-age home.

Mr Melvill recalled flying into Cape Town in 1997 during a three month round-the-world trip in the Long-EZ experimental aircraft he had built.

“When we came around the corner and saw Table Mountain laid out with the table cloth of clouds it was just beautiful. There is nothing to compare to Cape Town and I have been everywhere.”

Mr Melvill made history on Monday when he piloted the privately funded SpaceShipOne experimental aircraft into the blackness of sub-orbital space about 100km up before returning to earth.

The $20-million (R130-million) project was funded by Microsoft founder Paul Allen and the plane was designed by the aeronautical development company headed by designer Burt Rutan.

His first meal back on earth was braaivleis – he still calls it that – with his neighbours in Tehachapi, California, near the Mojave Desert airport where the space programme is based. “We were being hounded by the press all day and we were invited by our friends to a braai. I hadn’t eaten all day . . . and it sure tasted good.”

Mr Melvill appeared overwhelmed by the media attention. “I have been in incredible demand and they (the media) are making a big thing about this . . . it’s actually frightening. But I suppose it’s great to have some good news for a change.”

On Tuesday night, television network NBC sent a chauffeur to drive him 150km to its studios to appear on the Jay Leno show and tomorrow he flies to New York for more interviews.

Mr Melvill lives in Tehachapi with his wife, Sally, and their adult sons, Graham and Keith, live in nearby towns with their families.

Mrs Melvill said of her husband yesterday: “Mike is always cool – that is how he manages to keep on top of his work. For me, it was extremely nerve-racking when he took off, while in flight and then gliding back.

“It all happened too suddenly and it has not hit us yet. I suppose that it will take some time. But what was nice is that he received his astronaut wings from the federal aviation administration. It is proof of his accomplishment. Throughout his life he wanted to fly and at one time we practised hawkery for 10 years. Then Mike bought an aircraft kit from the inventor Mike Rutan.”

Mrs Melvill said that when her husband had finished the job Mr Rutan was so impressed that he invited the Melvills to work for him at his aerospace company, Scaled Composites, at the Mojave Airport, about 160km from Los Angeles.

Mr Melvill, who did not have formal experience, worked as an engineer. Mrs Melvill works in the human resources department.

In Durban, Mike’s sister, Rosemary, said she was extremely excited about her brother’s success. “He is simply magnificent. I knew he could do it. We all kept very silent about it because we did not know what was going to happen. But there was that little element, what if he goes up and never comes back?”

She said that her brother, whom she called her best friend, had played soccer, rugby and cricket and was very much a sports person. He loved birds and was an artist who showed great promise. “But it was the magic of flying that counted for him. He wanted to reach the stars,” she said.

His best friend from his schooldays, John Acutt, remembered how Mr Melvill was constantly experimenting with engines and building mechanical devices in his parent’s 18 hectare plot in Kloof outside Durban.

“One time he stripped an old Singer motorcar down to its chassis and left the engine in and strapped two wicker verandah chairs to it (where the seats had been) and we belted around Isobel Melvill’s (his mother’s) garden destroying her azaleas. I just can’t wait to see him again.”

Mr Melvill was born in Johannesburg in 1940 and his parents later moved to Durban. He went to primary school at Highbury in Hillcrest and later to Hilton College outside Maritzburg. He dropped out of school in form 9 (now Grade 11) to pursue his then childhood sweetheart Sally Smythe to Europe after her father had sent her to finishing school – partly to get her away from Mr Melvill.

The couple married in Scotland and in 1967 they moved to Indiana where Mr Melvill initially worked for his American-born father-in-law.

Hilton principal Mike Nicholson was among those who congratulated Mr Melvill yesterday, saying the school was very proud of his achievements.

Despite not finishing matric and without a tertiary education, Mr Melvill has become one of the world’s leading test pilots, with maiden flights on 10 of the 32 Scaled Composites designs. “You have to work hard, but you also got to have some luck,” he said.

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