Virgin Galactic's VSS Enterprise completes first manned release flight

Virgin Galactic, the company developing the world's first commercial manned space flight system and tourism business, has successfully completed the first piloted free flight of its Enterprise spacecraft.
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The craft was released from its mothership at an altitude of 45,000 ft (13,700 metres).
 
The two main goals of the flight were to carry out a clean release of the spaceship from its mothership and for the pilots to free fly and glide back and land at Mojave Air and Space Port in California.
 
Preparations for the milestone flight were extensive. The WhiteKnightTwo mothership (Eve) flew 40 times including 4 captive carry flights of spaceship and mothership mated together.
 
Commenting on the successful flight Scaled Composites pilot, Pete Siebold, said: “The VSS Enterprise was a real joy to fly, especially when one considers the fact that the vehicle has been designed not only to be a Mach 3.5 spaceship capable of going into space, but also one of the worlds highest altitude gliders.”
 
Sir Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Group, who was present during the first successful flight, added: “This was one of the most exciting days in the whole history of Virgin. For the first time since we seriously began the project in 2004, I watched the world’s first manned commercial spaceship landing on the runway at Mojave Air and Space Port and it was a great moment. Now, the sky is no longer the limit and we will begin the process of pushing beyond to the final frontier of space itself over the next year.”
 
Virgin Galactic is now well on the way to becoming the world’s first commercial space line with 370 customer deposits totalling $50 million. Future commercial operations will be at Spaceport America in New Mexico where final preparations are taking place for a finished runway inauguration ceremony on Friday 22nd October 2010.
 
The next challenges facing Virgin Galactic will be to complete its experimental program, obtain its FAA licence and bring the system into service at Spaceport America, New Mexico.
 
There will eventually be space tourism flights from Abu Dhabi. The emirate’s Aabar Investments and Virgin Group announced a strategic partnership in 2009, which saw Aabar take an equity stake in the company.
 
Under the deal, Aabar will ultimately invest US$280m and committed to funding a small satellite launch capability in the region.
 
Once space tourism gets under way in Abu Dhabi would-be astronauts are likely to pay around $200,000 for a two and a half hour flight that will take them to 60 miles above the earth.

While progress is being made on Virgin Galactic's manned launcher, the future of the company's satellite launching rocket “LauncherOne” may now be in doubt.

LauncherOne's manager, Adam Baker, has left the company and Richard Branson is now talking only about future possibilities for the rocket.

The launcher, if developed, would take satellites weighing up to 200kg (440lbs) into low-Earth orbit (LEO) for $1-2m per launch after being dropped from Virgin Galactic's WhiteKnightTwo aircraft at high altitude.

In July 2009, Aabar Investment offered Virgin Galactic $110m for LauncherOne development, if further studies could prove that there was a business case.

Satellite developers SSTL in Guildford, UK, backed out of the project after attempts to raise some feasibility funding from the then British National Space Centre (now the UK Space Agency) did not succeed.

 

 

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