Pattaya Daily News

March 23, 2010, [PDN]: Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo, successor to  SpaceShipOne, began its debut today, launched from the Mojave Air and Space Port, in California, for its three-hour test flight. First unveiled three and a half months ago, the dreamchild of Sir Richard Branson, of Virgin fame, SpaceShipTwo is designed to carry paying passengers almost into outer space.

Today’s test flight began the arduous task of checking out the rocket plane’s aerodynamics in a controlled, real-world environment. The craft requires that the rocket is taken up to an altitude about 50,000 feet firmly attached to the booster vehicle, WhiteKnightTwo’s twin fuselages. At that crucial height, the VSS Enterprise will then launch itself independently on its over-hyped quest ‘to go where no other has gone before’, or at least not that the mainstream knows about, but the reality may be significantly different; however, this is not the place to discuss the various ‘black-op space missions’ of the top governments of the world.

Suffice it to say that for the layman, this six-man, rocket propelled people carrier represents a milestone for commercial suborbital spaceflight. For the 330 individuals  who have contributed $45 million in deposits toward the individual $200,000 fare for a tour package, they will be treated to a rocket-powered roller-coaster ride, several minutes of weightlessness, or as the sales hype puts it ‘out-of-the-seat zero gravity experience’ as well as a truly bird’s eye view of their home planet.

Sir Dick, founder of Virgin Galactic, waxed eloquent about his new space-baby, saying ‘watching VSS Enterprise fly for the first time really brings home what beautiful, ground-breaking vehicles Burt and his team have developed for us. It comes as no surprise that the flight went so well; the Scaled team is uniquely qualified to bring this important and incredible dream to reality. Today was another major step along that road and a testament to US engineering and innovation.’

Virgin Galactic hopes to build five SpaceShipTwo planes and two WhiteKnightTwo carriers, in Branson’s quest to corner the commercial suborbital spaceflight market.

Taliesin Verity
Chief-Reporter
news@pattayadailynews.com

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