Commercial flight to space ‘for the curious’ will launch tomorrow with customers paying thousands
Virgin Galactic plans to launch a commercial space flight by the end of the month and their mission could blast off as soon as tomorrow (27 June).
The commercial space flight in human history, Galactic 01, has a launch window of 27 June to 30 June where the mission will be given the green light to take the first paying passengers up to space.
The space flight will consist of two craft, the carrier plane VMS Eve taking off with the VSS Unity spacecraft from Spaceport America Runway 34, New Mexico.
When the carrier plane reaches an altitude of 50,000, it will then drop the SpaceShipTwo class vehicle which will carry passengers into space, where they will experience a few minutes of weightlessness.
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VSS Unity will then glide back down to Earth and make a runway landing without power, and if all of that happens the way it ought to then it'll mark the beginning of commercial space travel.
The space flight will be commanded by former US Air Force officer Michael Masucci and piloted by former Italian Air Force pilot Nicola Pecile.
The flight will also be a scientific research mission carrying three crew members from the Italian Air Force and the National Research Council of Italy so they can research microgravity.
Colonel Walter Villadei will be wearing a biometric smart suit to measure his physiological responses on board the space flight, while Lt Colonel Angelo Landolfi will be testing cognitive performance and how certain liquids and solids mix in a microgravity environment.
Pantaleone Carlucci will have his heart rate, brain function and other faculties measured during the spaceflight through a series of wearable sensors.
Virgin Galactic instructor Colin Bennett will also be on board the VSS Unity for the flight to 'assess the research flight experience'.
If all goes well, then the second commercial spaceflight is pencilled in for August and the plan is to put on monthly spaceflights thereafter with people who've paid for tickets to space getting their chance at last.
Virgin Galactic says this is the beginning of space travel 'for the curious', but it's also going to be for the very wealthy as the price of a seat on board one of their missions will cost you an eye-watering amount.
If you've got £350,000 ($450,000) burning a hole in your bank account and a fierce desire to go to space, then this could be the opportunity you've been waiting for, otherwise you'll have to wait for commercial space travel to become widely available.
Last year, Virgin Galactic founder Sir Richard Branson told LADbible they were 'at the start of making it more accessible to people' but realistically it was 'gonna take some years' before everyone would be able to get a go on his spaceship.
How many years is difficult to say but Branson promised they'll 'do our best to speed it up' as it's something he'd like to see in his lifetime.
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While prices are higher now the first batch of tickets sold for £156,000 ($200,000) and over the past decade, Virgin Galactic have sold about 800 tickets to prospective space travellers.
It might take them a while to get through everyone as the Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo vessels, like the VSS Unity, have a capacity for six people and two of those are crew members so it'll have to be four at a time.
If you start saving now, they might have worked their way through most of the queue by the time you've got enough money.
Topics: Space, Travel, Technology, US News, News, Richard Branson
Joe Harker