Virgin Galactic logo.
July 11, 2021
The billionaire, who hopes to pave the way for space tourism, must spend a few minutes in zero gravity aboard a ship of his company.
Image above: Richard Branson, the eccentric 70-year-old billionaire, founder of the Virgin Group (whose activities range from an airline to fitness), has long cultivated his hothead image, multiplying sporting exploits.
He has always dreamed of it and 17 years ago founded his own company to make it happen: today (Sunday), billionaire Richard Branson must finally fly into space from New Mexico, in the United States, for a few minutes in zero gravity aboard a Virgin Galactic ship.
The Briton hopes to get the nascent space tourism industry off the ground for good. But also beat Jeff Bezos, winning the title of the first billionaire to cross this final frontier thanks to the ship of a company he founded himself.
Amazon founder’s other big rival, SpaceX boss Elon Musk, announced on Twitter that he would attend the takeoff on Sunday. "I'll see you there to wish you the best," he told Richard Branson. Billionaires have already traveled to space in the 2000s, but on Russian rockets.
Richard Branson’s official role during the trip: to test and evaluate the experience that future customers will have. The flight is scheduled to take place from 7:00 a.m. local time (3:00 p.m. in Switzerland), with a live video broadcast on the Virgin Galactic website. This is not really a rocket, but rather a huge carrier plane, flown by two pilots, which must first take off from a traditional runway and gain altitude for about an hour.
VSS Unity’s first fully crewed flight
Below this plane hangs the VSS Unity spacecraft - an example of the SpaceShipTwo model - with two other pilots and four passengers on board: Richard Branson and three company employees. At some 15 kilometers high, the spacecraft, which is about the size of a private jet, will be dropped and ignite its engine for a supersonic ascent, to exceed 80 km in altitude - the limit set for United States for the frontier of space.
SpaceShipTwo
Once the engine is off, passengers can detach from their seats to float for a few minutes in zero gravity, and admire the curvature of the Earth from one of the cabin's 12 portholes. After peaking at about 90 km altitude, the ship will glide back down.
Space base
The eccentric 70-year-old billionaire, founder of the Virgin Group (whose activities range from an airline to fitness), have long cultivated his hothead image, by multiplying his sporting exploits.
“When I was a kid I wanted to go to space. As it didn't seem likely to my generation, I registered the Virgin Galactic name, with the idea of starting a business that could make this possible, ”wrote Richard Branson days before departure. A goal that almost came to an end in 2014: the in-flight accident of a Virgin Galactic spacecraft resulted in the death of a pilot, significantly delaying the program. Since then, VSS Unity has already reached three times the space, in 2018, 2019 and last May, with pilots on board, and even a passenger in 2019.
Spaceport America
Today, the event takes place at Spaceport America, a space base built in the New Mexico desert, less than 100 km north of the small town of Las Cruces. Virgin Galactic is the initiative for its construction, largely funded by this state in the southwest of the United States, and is the main customer. The base includes a runway more than 3.6 km long and a building with spaces dedicated to flight operations, as well as to the reception of future customers.
Regular flights in 2022?
After Sunday, Virgin Galactic plans two new test flights, then the start of regular commercial operations for early 2022. And ultimately aims to conduct 400 flights per year from Spaceport America. Some 600 tickets have already been sold to people from 60 different countries - including Hollywood celebrities - for a price of between $ 200,000 and $ 250,000.
Even if Richard Branson keeps repeating that according to him, "space belongs to all of us", the adventure therefore remains within the reach of only the privileged. "When I return (from space), I will be announcing something very exciting to allow more people to become astronauts," he promised.
The competition in the space tourism sector, whose imminent advent has been announced for years, has accelerated tremendously this month: the richest man in the world, Jeff Bezos, is also due to fly on the 20th. July, with its own rocket, named New Shepard and developed by its company Blue Origin. The latter published a table on Friday extolling its merits over those of Virgin Galactic: New Shepard climbs up to more than 100 km in altitude, thus exceeding what is called the Karman line, marking the beginning space according to the international convention. "None of our astronauts will have an asterisk next to their name," Blue Origin quipped.
Editor's note:
A small precision that the non-specialized media do not know, after the Virgin Galactic flight today, the passengers are not astronauts, to deserve this title you must have completed at least one orbit around the Earth in space (like Gagarin, the first in history), in these are only space tourists and in no way astronauts, so will the same for passengers of Blue Origin, as these two companies practice flight ballistic and not orbital flight.
Related article:
NASA-Supported Plant Experiment Flies to Suborbital Space with Virgin Galactic
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2021/07/nasa-supported-plant-experiment-flies.html
Related link:
Virgin Galactic: https://www.virgingalactic.com/
Images, Text, Credits: AFP/Virgin Galactic/Orbiter.ch Aerospace/Roland Berga/SciNews.
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