Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo for space tourists in successful test flight
April 30, 2013
Mojave, CA, United States (4E) – Virgin Galactic’s tourist spacecraft made its first rocket-powered flight over the Mojave Desert in California on Monday to bring space tourism one step closer to reality.
The SpaceShipTwo was dropped by the carrier plane WhiteKnightTwo at 46,000 feet before firing its rocket engine to reach the edge of space, about 60 miles from the Earth’s surface, at Mach 1.2 or more than the speed of sound.
Test pilots Mark Stucky and Mike Alsbury were aboard the SpaceShipTwo in the milestone flight launched from the Mojave Air and Space Port, about 100 miles northeast of Los Angeles.
Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Galactic, said the successful test flight makes possible the start of space tours by next year.
SpaceShipTwo can carry up to six passengers and Virgin Galactic plans to have several flights per day when regular operation starts.
Each passenger will pay $200,000 for the experience of weightlessness in suborbital altitude and seeing the curvature of the Earth from space. The spaceship then glides back to the runway of Spaceport America in New Mexico.
More than 500 people have signed up for the space tour and are waiting for their flights.