Armadillo completed the first of its two flights for Level One of the Lunar Lander Challenge at about 1:25 MDT. It appears to have been a success, but there are now reports that there was a fire of some kind after landing–whether on the vehicle or pad is unclear–and it seems unlikely they will make a second flight attempt today.

A few updates here at the X Prize Cup just after 1 pm MDT Friday:

• Apparently the window for Armadillo’s launch has been extended, although exactly when they will attempt their flight remains unknown;
• At least one team (from the Univ. of Michigan) has climbed the tether in the Space Elevator Games;
• The only major activity at the Cup in the last hour or so have been F-117 flybys and a flight by a Learjet simulating the course that a Rocket Racing League X-Racer would fly (with course graphics superimposed live on the video screens here. There was also a demonstration of Orion Propulsion’s rocket bike, but it fizzled somewhat.

It looks like there’s setting up for another Rocket Belt demo now.

Earlier in the morning they did a demo of the “Rocket Belt”: a rocket backpack that allows a man to fly–for 30 seconds. They the demo right in front of the media center:

Fairly entertaining, especially for the kids.

Shortly before Armadillo carted out their vehicle for their Lunar Lander Challenge attempt, Tripoli carried out another high-powered amateur launch:

This was one more powerful than the one earlier this morning, and its parachutes worked as well.

The 2.5-hour window for Armadillo Aerospace’s Lunar Lander Challenge Level 1 attempt started about 10 minutes ago when they crossed a white line on the tarmac at the airport. A few minutes later their vehicle, Pixel, was loaded onto a truck and headed for the competition site in the airport midfield.

Armadillo’s Lunar Lander Challenge launch has been delayed by technical issues: apparently there is some wireless interference disrupting their link to their vehicle. They’re planning to go later this morning; they have a 2.5-hour launch window that opens at 11 am MDT. One team member said they believe they have a 70% chance of winning the Level One challenge, and perhaps a 15% chance of winning Level Two. If Level One goes well,m as well as a qualifying test later in the day, they plan to try for Level Two tomorrow.

Here’s a brief video of the Tripoli launch earlier this morning:

We had our first flight event just after 8:15 am MDT, with the launch of a Goddard replica rocket by Tripoli. The launch looked great:

However, the rocket’s parachute failed to deploy and it crashed in a cloud of smoke.

Armadillo Aerospace is scheduled to fly in about an hour for level one of the Lunar Lander Challenge, according to latest reports.

We’re an hour into the event and not much has happened: everything seems to be running behind schedule. We did have the ceremonial ribbon cutting with Peter Diamandis, Buzz Aldrin, and others at 7 am:

Unfortunately, it looked like they used space elevator carbon nanotube material for the ribbon, so it took some time for them to cut it. But they did succeed:

More to come!

Because the gates for the X Prize Cup opened at 6 am, I thought I should get here as close to 6 as possible, to beat the rush. And beat the rush I did: although there were minor delays getting through the security checkpoint outside the airport, I ended up being the first one in the press center at a quarter after six. It’s still pretty quiet here, as attendees trickle in. Now if only there were lights in the tent that serves as the press center: it’s still over a half-hour before sunrise, and I’m typing by the light of my laptop’s display.