The brainchild of legendary aircraft designer Burt Rutan, the Beechcraft Starship was a radical departure from conventional designs, starting fresh with many untried concepts. Featuring twin-pusher turboprop engines, canard configuration and composite construction, the Starship was well ahead of its time when Beechcraft contracted with Rutan’s Scaled Composites in 1981 to build an 85-percent-scale proof of concept. That project culminated with the flight of the first production Starship in 1989. Despite excellent performance, in the end, only 53 Starships were built. Beechcraft blamed slow sales of the model on a down economy and the airplane’s unconventional looks. In 2003, Beech began buying back Starships and cutting them up. Only five privately owned Starships remain today.