Virgin Galactic explodes in space with billionaire Richard Branson on board

The boss of the American SpaceX and rival of Bezos, Elon musk, announced on Twitter that he will attend takeoff on Sunday. “I’ll see you there to wish you luck,” he said to Branson.

The Briton will have a very specific mission during his trip: to test and evaluate the experience that his future customers will have.

The take-off, which was scheduled for 7 a.m., had to be rescheduled by an hour and a half due to weather conditions, the company said this morning.

The flight will be broadcast live via the Virgin Galactic website.

Other billionaires have already been to space in the 2000s, but on Russian rockets.

On this occasion, the journey will not begin with a rocket, but with a huge plane that will transport the spacecraft.

Once taken off from a traditional runway, the plane, driven by two pilots, will rise for about an hour.

Hanging from the bottom of the plane will be the VSS Unity spacecraft – a copy of the SpaceShipTwo model – with two other pilots and four passengers on board: Richard Branson and three company employees.

At a height of about 15 kilometers, the spacecraft, which is the size of a private jet, will release and ignite its engine for a supersonic ascent to a height of over 80 kilometers, the limit set in the United States. for the spatial frontier. .

Once the engine is off, passengers will be able to get up from their seats and float for a few minutes in zero gravity, and observe the curvature of the Earth from one of the cabin’s 12 windows.

After reaching a maximum altitude of about 90 km, the spacecraft will descend.

“When I was a kid I wanted to go to space. As it seemed unlikely to my generation, I registered the name Virgin Galactic, with the idea of ​​starting a business that would make that possible,” wrote Richard Branson a few. a few days ago.

A goal that almost failed in 2014: the mid-flight accident of a Virgin Galactic spacecraft resulted in the death of a pilot, significantly delaying the program.

Since then, VSS Unity has already arrived in space three times, in 2018 and 2019, with pilots on board and even a passenger in 2019.

On Sunday, the event will be held 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 has started construction, largely funded by this state in the southwestern United States.

The base includes a runway more than 3.6 km long and a building with spaces dedicated to air operations, as well as to the reception of future customers.

After this Sunday, Virgin Galactic plans two other test flights, then begins regular commercial operations in early 2022. Ultimately, it intends to perform 400 flights per year from Spaceport America.

Some 600 tickets have already been sold to people from 60 different countries, including Hollywood celebrities, for an amount between $ 200,000 and $ 250,000.

Although Branson keeps repeating that “space belongs to everyone”, the adventure remains within the grasp of the privileged few.

“When I come back (from space), I will be announcing something very exciting so that more people can become astronauts,” he promised.

Competition in the space tourism sector, whose imminent start has been announced for years, has accelerated dizzyingly this month: the richest man in the world, Jeff Bezos, also plans to reach the space on July 20 with the New Shepard rocket, developed by his company. Blue origin.

The firm showed its merits on Friday against those of Virgin Galactic: the New Shepard culminates at more than 100 km in height, and thus exceeds what is called the Karman line, which marks the beginning of space according to the international convention .