The space company Virgin Galactic wants to conduct its first commercial flight with space tourists at the end of June, after years of delay. The company of the British billionaire Richard Branson has announced this today.
At the end of May, another flight with four employees of the company is planned. The ‘Unity 25’ mission will be “the final evaluation of the entire space system and the astronaut experience before the start of commercial flights at the end of June,” Virgin Galactic announced.
LOOK. Two years ago, Branson made spectacular history with the first spaceflight with ordinary passengers. The businessman then accompanied the successful test flight himself
Founder Richard Branson himself was a passenger on the previous space flight, almost two years ago in the summer of 2021. Since then, adjustments have been made to the transport aircraft and the spaceship.
‘Galactic 01’
Flight ‘Unity 25’ will be Virgin Galactic’s fifth space flight. In such a flight, a transport aircraft lifts the spaceship and its occupants into the air, after which the spaceship is unloaded and flies further into space (more than 80 kilometers above the earth) under its own power, before descending again and landing itself . The passengers are weightless for several minutes during the journey. The flights depart from a base in the US state of New Mexico.
The first commercial flight, dubbed ‘Galactic 01’, should then take place at the end of June.
Years of delay
Virgin Galactic’s space tourism program was delayed for years, including after an accident in 2014 that killed a pilot.
The company says it has already sold 800 tickets to space tourists. Customers have to be warm: they have to pay a total of $ 450,000 (397,000 euros), including an immediate down payment of $ 150,000 (132,000 euros), as it became known earlier. The price includes a multi-day training and of course also the space travel itself. The trip lasts 90 minutes, culminating in a few minutes of weightlessness.
Shares of Virgin Galactic Holdings jumped more than a fifth after today’s announcement.
Bezos and Musk
Branson’s company competes with Blue Origin from American billionaire Jeff Bezos and SpaceX from Elon Musk, among others. Blue Origin also offers short space flights and has already launched 32 people into space so far. But since an accident in September 2022 during an unmanned flight, the rig’s launch vehicle has been grounded. In March, Blue Origin said spaceflights would resume “soon”.
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LOOK. In September last year, things went wrong for Blue Origin with an unmanned flight. Ht was the first time that its New Shepard missiles had failed a mission
LOOK ALSO. Jeff Bezos’ first human spaceflight in 2021, not long after Branson’s first flight, was a huge success. Bezos also went into space himself, together with his brother, an 82-year-old pilot and an 18-year-old Dutchman
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