Manifest Destiny History

Following is a timeline of the Manifest Destiny official universe.

2000's

2008: The first commercial sub-orbital flights are offered to the paying public for $200,000 per seat. Demand is high.

2009: America's Space Prize is claimed by Virgin Galactic when the SpaceShipThree prototype completes three orbits and a simulated docking before returning to the launch site, and repeats it 43 days later with five orbits.

2010's

2010: Space Shuttle is decommissioned

2011: The supply gap for the International Space Station is filled through commercial manned and unmanned missions from various spaceflight firms.

2014: The first commercial orbital flights are offered to the paying public for $3,000,000 per seat for five orbits.

2015: Project Constellation's Orion CEV completes it's first manned flight, one year behind schedule. NASA faced criticism for falling behind the private sector's space innovations.

2016: Bigelow Aerospace launches the first operational BA 330 "Nautilus" space habitat. It is operated as a space hotel, and receives regular visits from the three commercial orbital spaceflight carriers.

2017: Gasoline prices peak at $10 per gallon during a 4-month production shortage. New drilling increased the available crude oil, and government subsidization and re-negotiation of supply agreements with OPEC caused prices to stabilize around $6.50 per gallon. Commercial spaceflight continues at a reduced rate due to increased fuel costs.

2018: DARPA funding for advanced energy projects is increased to $500 million per year. Focus is given to solar, nuclear fusion, and antimatter research.

2019: Man returns to the Moon using the Project Constellation's Lunar Surface Access Module (LSAM). A series of three flights were flown over two years to perform scientific research and deliver cargo.

2020's

2022: The fourth LSAM flight to the Moon formally established a permanent base of two Americans astronauts and one Russian cosmonaut at Brighton Beach.

2023: Partially due to increased usage, the world-wide supply of crude oil and petroleum fell quicker than expected, causing gasoline prices above $20 per gallon. Scandal erupted when it was revealed the falling supply levels had been known but kept secret.

2025: Scientist and policy makers from 54 countries convened the World Energy Panel of 2025. They avoided prohibitively expensive travel and collaborated via the internet. Encouraged by the recent discovery of antimatter within in Van Allen belts, the panel determined that the use of antimatter as an energy source was humanity's best hope for a global energy solution. Significant applied research grants were made available to the most promising antimatter research laboratories.