Virgin Galactic launches its first commercial spaceflight – 06/29/2023 – Science

A three-man team from Italy is set to board a passenger rocket plane operated by Virgin Galactic, the venture founded by British billionaire Richard Branson in 2004, for the company’s first commercial flight to the edge on Thursday. from space.

The two Italian Air Force officers and an aerospace engineer from Italy’s National Research Council join the Virgin Galactic instructor and the spacecraft’s two pilots on a suborbital ride that will take them about 50 miles (80 km) above of the New Mexico desert.

The flight, called Galactic 01, comes two years after Branson flew along with five other Virgin Galactic Holdings Inc (SPCE.N) employees on the company’s first fully manned test space flight of its spacecraft, VSS Unity.

At the time, Virgin Galactic officials said they expected to start regular commercial operations in 2022 after additional test flights. However, completing the test campaign took longer than anticipated after federal regulators suspended the craft for 11 weeks while the company was under investigation for deviating from its designated airspace during the July 2021 flight. The last manned test flight into space was carried out successfully, but with less fanfare, five weeks ago.

Virgin Galactic is one of the few private companies, including SpaceX and Blue Origin, that cater to wealthy aspiring astronauts, citizens willing to pay large sums of money to experience the thrill of supersonic rocket speed, weightlessness and the spectacle of space. space flight.

The mission for the Italian team flying on Thursday, however, was billed as a science mission, with the three men planning to collect biometric data, measure cognitive performance and record how certain liquids and solids mix in microgravity.

ITALIAN RESEARCH MISSION

For Colonel Walter Villadei of the Italian Air Force, the flight is also part of his astronaut training for a future mission on the International Space Station.

Joining him are two Italian colleagues – Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Angelo Landolfi, a flight physician and surgeon, and Pantaleone Carlucci, a member of the research board acting as a flight engineer and payload specialist.

The fourth passenger seat is occupied by Virgin Galactic trainer Colin Bennett, who earned his astronaut wings on the July 2021 flight with Branson as the company’s lead operations engineer. Unity will be operated by two Virgin Galactic pilots – retired US Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Michael Masucci and Nicola Pecile, who previously held the same rank in the Italian air force.

The 90-minute flight profile is expected to follow the sequence Unity flew two years ago.

The gleaming white spacecraft is ready to take off from Spaceport America, a state facility near the New Mexico town of Truth or Consequences, docked to the underside of its twin-body transporter plane, VMS Eve, named in tribute to Branson’s late mother.

Reaching its high-altitude launch point at around 50,000 feet (9.5 miles/15.24 km), Unity will be released from the mothership and fly away as the spacecraft’s rocket fires, causing the vehicle to fire rapidly. upward at supersonic speed into the blackness of space at an altitude of about 50-55 miles (80-89 km).

At the apex of its ascent, the rocket shuts down and the crew experiences a few minutes of near weightlessness before the spacecraft switches to re-entry mode to begin a downward glide towards an airstrip back to the spaceport.

If all goes well, Unity will fly again in early August, with monthly flights thereafter, the company said.

Virgin Galactic had projected to book its first 1,000 paying customers, charging around $250,000 per seat, when commercial service opened. Company officials have said they intend to eventually build a fleet large enough to accommodate 400 flights annually.

Demonstrating that rocket travel is safe for the public is critical. An earlier prototype of Virgin Galactic’s spacecraft crashed during a test flight over California’s Mojave Desert in 2014, killing one pilot and seriously injuring another. Passengers are now required to sign a pre-flight waiver acknowledging the risks and lack of government regulation of space tourism.

The bragging rights about what is considered real spaceflight has also played into the business.

NASA and the United States Air Force define an astronaut as anyone who has flown at an altitude of 50 miles (80 km) or more.

Rival billionaire Jeff Bezos, whose astro-tourism venture Blue Origin has flown several commercial passenger flights, has criticized Virgin Galactic for not offering a true spaceflight experience.

Unlike Unity, according to Bezos, Blue Origin’s New Shepard suborbital rocket exceeds the 62-mile-high (100 km) mark, called the Karman line, established by an international aviation body as defining the boundary between Earth’s atmosphere and space.

Editing by Will Dunham.