Tag: Virgin Galactic

Virgin Galactic rockets its first tourist passengers into space

By Lucie AUBOURG Virgin Galactic launched its first tourist passengers into the weightlessness of space Thursday, the culmination of a nearly two-decade commercial pursuit, the company said. The three passengers — Jon Goodwin, Keisha Schahaff, and her teenage daughter Anastatia Mayers — floated gravity-free through the Virgin spacecraft about 45 minutes after taking off. “They are officially astronauts. Welcome to space,” said Virgin Galactic announcer Sirisha Bandla as the spacecraft pushed above 80 kilometers (50 […]

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After long wait, Virgin Galactic begins commercial spaceflights

By Issam AHMED WASHINGTON, June 29, 2023 (AFP) – Virgin Galactic is set Thursday to finally begin commercial spaceflights, a major milestone for the company founded in 2004 by British billionaire Richard Branson. Its first paying customers are a three-member crew from the Italian Air Force and National Research Council of Italy, with a fourth seat occupied by a Virgin Galactic astronaut instructor. Dubbed Galactic 01, the 90-minute mission will take off from Spaceport America, […]

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‘Experience of a lifetime’: Billionaire Branson achieves space dream

  by Lucie AUBOURG Agence France Presse British billionaire Richard Branson flew into space Sunday aboard a Virgin Galactic vessel, a voyage he described as the “experience of a lifetime” — and one he hopes will usher in an era of lucrative space tourism. The mission’s success allowed the swashbuckling septuagenarian to one-up fellow tycoon Jeff Bezos — who owns space company Blue Origin and is set to launch on July 20 — in the […]

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Virgin Galactic seeks space tourism boost with market launch

LONDON, United Kingdom (AFP) — Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic will merge with a New York-listed company to become the world’s first publicly-traded space tourism venture, the British billionaire’s group announced Tuesday. “By embarking on this new chapter, at this advanced point in Virgin Galactic’s development, we can open space to more investors and in doing so, open space to thousands of new astronauts,” Branson said in a statement. Virgin Galactic and public-investment vehicle Social Capital […]

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Virgin Galactic reaches space for first time

by Gene Blevins Agence France Presse MOJAVE, United States (AFP) — Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo, VSS Unity, flew higher than it ever has before on Thursday, surpassing what the US Air Force considers the boundary of space, and marking the first manned flight to space from US soil since 2011. The brief, suborbital flight — with two pilots on board — was a key milestone for the company headed by British tycoon Richard Branson, who is […]

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First space tourist flights could come in 2019

by Ivan Couronne Agence France-Presse WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — The two companies leading the pack in the pursuit of space tourism say they are just months away from their first out-of-this-world passenger flights — though neither has set a firm date. Virgin Galactic, founded by British billionaire Richard Branson, and Blue Origin, by Amazon creator Jeff Bezos, are racing to be the first to finish their tests — with both companies using radically different […]

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Pilot actions examined in U.S. crash of Virgin Galactic spacecraft

(Reuters) – A human-factors expert will join the investigation of the fatal crash of Virgin Galactic’s passenger spacecraft to study why the co-pilot prematurely unlocked a pivoting tail section of the ship during a test flight, a top safety official said on Monday. The untimely engagement of the tail mechanism, designed to slow the vehicle’s descent into the atmosphere from space, and the possibility that pilot error was to blame, were disclosed by the National […]

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Test flight of Virgin Galactic spaceship ends in fatal crash in California

(Reuters) – A passenger spaceship being developed by Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic company crashed during a test flight on Friday near the Mojave Air and Space Port in California, killing one pilot and seriously injuring the other, officials said. The crash of the suborbital vehicle, undergoing its first powered test flight since January over the Mojave Desert, 95 miles (150 km) north of Los Angeles, came days after another private space company, Orbital Sciences Corp, […]

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