From outward appearances, the spacecraft is almost identical to the one lost on October 31, 2014.
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Virgin Galactic said it will launch operations from New Mexico once it believes it is safe to do so. I’d be tempted if I could afford it, but not until Virgin Galactic proves they can learn from past mistakes and stop tragedy from being a recurring theme. The accident was blamed on pilot error and oversights by Northrop Gumman Corp’s Scaled Composites division, which designed, built and tested the vehicle, known as SpaceShipTwo.
Seats on the ride, which can carry six passengers at a time, will cost 250,000 U.S. dollars – around £174,500 – with more than 700 people said to have signed up so far.
Testing on the SpaceShipTwo, which Branson said was constructed by a team of 650 engineers, will begin with the electrical system and moving parts, followed by flights attached to the WhiteKnightTwo mothership before progressing to glide testing. Once aloft, it would drop the craft, which would ignite its engines and fly past the edge of space, where passengers would experience weightlessness and see the Earth from more than 100 km, generally considered the threshold of space.
An investigation found that co-pilot Michael Alsbury prematurely unlocked a system created to slow the craft as it re-enters the atmosphere. It is a replacement for the one that crashed and killed a test pilot in 2014.
Virgin Galactic revealed its new Unity spaceship on Friday, which it hopes will be the first vehicle to take tourists to space.
As Virgin Galactic explains in a statement, SpaceShipTwo will first embark on a rigorous testing period and “will remain on the ground for a while after her unveiling”. Whether Virgin considers itself embroiled in a competition to get the first paying customers to space or not, we’re positive the thought that’s been haunting Richard Branson the last several months is “who says Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos gets to have all the fun?” The event also marked the special official naming moment of the new SpaceShipTwo, with Stephen Hawking announcing the name VSS Unity via a specially recorded message.
Virgin Galactic is determined to bring humans on commercial space flights with the launch of its SpaceShipTwo on Friday at Mojave Air & Space Port in California. “We’re looking forward to more collaborations across the business including STEM programmes as well as engineering, design and product initiatives”.
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Sir Richard Branson’s one-year-old granddaughter Christened VSS Unity with a bottle of milk. Later, he went on, “We’d like to join the race for space exploration”. The company said that it has committed to test from scratch to all-set.
