Virgin Galactic, the space tourism company founded by UK entrepreneur Richard Branson in 2004, has achieved a major milestone by successfully completing its first commercial flight to the edge of space. The flight, named Galactic 01, took place above the New Mexico desert and lasted approximately 75 minutes.
On board the VSS Unity spaceplane were two Italian air force officers, an aerospace engineer from the National Research Council of Italy, and the spaceplane’s two pilots. The spaceplane reached an altitude of about 80km (50 miles), providing the passengers with a few minutes of weightlessness and a view of the Earth’s curvature.
The VSS Unity spaceplane, carried by a “mothership” aircraft with two pilots, took off from a runway, ascended to a high altitude, and then deployed its rocket-powered engines. It soared into space at nearly Mach 3 (three times the speed of sound) before gliding safely back to Earth, landing on a runway at Spaceport America, located near the town of Truth or Consequences in New Mexico.
This successful commercial flight comes two years after Virgin Galactic’s first fully crewed test spaceflight of the VSS Unity rocket plane. The achievement represents a significant turning point for Virgin Galactic Holding Inc., which has faced numerous development setbacks during its nearly two decades of working towards establishing a commercial space service.
During a live stream of the launch, Sirisha Bandla, a member of Virgin Galactic, welcomed the passengers to space. The United States space agency NASA and the US Air Force define an astronaut as someone who has flown at least 80km (50 miles) above Earth, making the passengers of this flight eligible for astronaut status.
Virgin Galactic has sold approximately 800 tickets for its commercial flights, with 600 tickets sold between 2005 and 2014 for prices ranging from $200,000 to $250,000 each. Since then, 200 tickets have been sold for $450,000 each. Initially, movie stars and celebrities were among the first to secure seats, but the company faced a setback in 2014 when a test flight resulted in the mid-air breakup of a spaceplane, causing the death of the co-pilot and serious injuries to the pilot.
In addition to its commercial aims, Thursday’s flight also had scientific objectives. The crew planned to collect biometric data, measure cognitive performance, and observe how certain liquids and solids behave in microgravity.
Virgin Galactic’s next scheduled commercial space flight, Galactic 02, is planned for August, with monthly flights to space expected to follow after that. The company is competing in the suborbital space tourism sector with Blue Origin, the company founded by American billionaire Jeff Bezos. Blue Origin had already sent 32 people into space but had to pause its operations following an accident during an unmanned flight in September. Blue Origin recently announced plans to resume spaceflights soon.
It is worth noting that the successful launch of Virgin Galactic’s commercial flight comes shortly after Virgin Orbit, a separate venture of Richard Branson, announced the cessation of its operations following a mission failure in the United Kingdom earlier this year.
