Branson (Virgin Galactic): the first flights by year-end "tourist" in the ... - Il Sole 24 Ore

Article History

Close

Into This entry was posted on May 1, 2013 at 10:12.

Into Into Mind you this is not going to the Moon or Mars, but to sub orbital flights, ie go to 100 thousand meters above the ground to see how he does see the whole Earth as a round blue.

video

Into SpaceShipTwo, as at other times, he got up in the air from the space-based Virgin America thanks to its great mother plane, WhiteKnightTwo, which took him to share up to 14 thousand meters attached to his belly and when it was abandoned in a vacuum, above the Mojave Desert of California, has turned its powerful engine. Full success: in just a few seconds, 16 to be precise, the spacecraft has reached supersonic speed and then came back to the base almost gliding. You have reached a speed of Mach 1.2, since only a first taste to get to the commercial quota promise to the many who have already booked a flight takes more thrust.

Into All satisfied, even enthusiastic, beginning with Sir Richard Branson who considers this his most difficult and risky in economic terms. The press has issued a statement in which he says that certain tourist flights after this test that shows how each component functions, will be starting later this year. Customers of Virgin Galactic already has several, about 500 to 200 thousand dollars reservations in place for the single class with only 6 passengers per flight, Hollywood stars and the scientist Stephen Hawcking among the first to write a check for the ticket stellar. The first flight, the right to advertise, passengers will see how Sir Branson and family, you do not know how happy privilege.

Into course in 2005 when Branson founded Virgin Galactic also co-opting Burt Rutan, a pioneer of the space race by the private sector, especially in very few state agency thought that “private” would have done something in the space field.

Into Instead, after a few years are at least 10 companies in this business, such as Xcor Aerospace, the most direct competitor of the Virgin, which is developing a rocket plane smaller than StarShipTwo called Lynx, which will lead to a single passenger time, in addition to the pilot, always at 100 kilometers from the soil.

If this is not enough and you want to own the thrill of the astronaut you can start vertically on a Apollo capsule type, the one that went to the moon, with the Armadillo magnate John Carmack of video games. It is 100 kilometers from the ground in pairs and for only 110 thousand euro. There are some who think to send into orbit space stations for tourists on low cost inflatables, you read that right, since in orbit gravity is very low and there is no need to have all that metal that weighs and costs. And ‘the Bigelow Aerospace in Nevada.

Into Although it may seem like a game is not at all, as demonstrated by the fact that the circulation of money that has been developing in recent months is remarkable, just think of the billion dollar contracts awarded by NASA with Space X for the supply of the International Space Station . Not much is known about the secret project of Blue Origin, Jeff Bezos, Amazon founder and owner of which should lead to even Space Station a stronauts. A preliminary contract with NASA study, 25 million nonsense in this branch of industry, however, shows the reality of the project which has as its objective the first human flight “private” in 2018.

© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Into

Permalink