Tag: SpaceShipTwo
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Station astronaut calls private spaceflight ‘next breakthrough’
NASA astronaut Reid Wiseman aboard the International Space Station. Credit: NASA Space station astronaut Reid Wiseman, preparing to return to Earth this weekend after 165 days in orbit, said Monday commercial spaceflight represents the “next breakthrough” in aerospace technology, and that he hopes Virgin Galactic can ultimately turn that dream into reality despite the fatal…
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Virgin Galactic rocket plane deployed braking system prematurely
NTSB acting chairman Christopher Hart describes SpaceShipTwo’s feathering system in a media briefing Sunday. Credit: NTSB Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo rocket plane disintegrated in mid-air after two tail stabilizers prematurely extended, federal investigators said Sunday, a discovery that could shift the focus of the probe into Friday’s fatal crash away from the craft’s rocket motor. But…
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Branson vows to press ahead, NTSB investigation begins
STORY WRITTEN FOR CBS NEWS “SPACE PLACE” & USED WITH PERMISSION Updated at 12:10 AM EDT, 11/02/14: Adding NTSB news conference; identity of surviving pilot Virgin Galactic’s George Whiteside and Richard Branson speak with the news media. Image: Virgin Galactic. Richard Branson, the charismatic leader of Virgin Galactic and a driving force in the push to commercialize…
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SpaceShipTwo crash inquiry could take a year
Acting chairman of the NTSB Christopher Hart surveys the SpaceShipTwo crash site with Virgin Galactic pilot Todd Ericson. Credit: NTSB Investigators have plenty of evidence to sift through as they look into the cause of Friday’s fatal crash of a Virgin Galactic rocket plane, but the acting chair of the National Transportation Safety Board said…
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VIDEO: NTSB news conference on start of SpaceShipTwo investigation
The NTSB’s Acting Chairman Christopher Hart holds a news conference Saturday evening to discuss the start of the investigation into the loss of Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo rocket plane over the Mojave Desert.
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VIDEO: First NTSB briefing on Virgin Galactic accident
Acting NTSB Chairman Christopher Hart briefs the news media on Saturday, soon after arriving at the Mojave Air & Space Port to begin an investigation into the loss of Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo.
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SpaceShipTwo crashes in desert, one pilot dead, one seriously injured
SpaceShipTwo (Credit: Virgin Galactic) It’s a rough week in the spaceflight world. Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo has crashed during a test flight over the Mojave Desert in southern California. The company announced through its Twitter feed that SpaceShipTwo had “suffered a serious anomaly.” UPDATE:Virgin Galactic’s partner Scaled Composites conducted a powered test flight of #SpaceShipTwo earlier today.…
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Pilot dies in crash of Virgin Galactic rocket plane
Updated with more details at 7:30 p.m. PDT (10:30 p.m. EDT; 0230 GMT) Spaceship Two and its mothership WhiteKnightTwo earlier today. Photo: Scaled Composites / Jason DiVenere. Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo rocket plane crashed during a powered test flight over California’s Mojave Desert on Friday, leaving one pilot dead and another seriously injured. One of the…
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Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo fails during test flight
One pilot has died and another seriously injured during a test flight failure of Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo on Friday. The much-delayed suborbital space tourism vehicle suffered a catastrophic failure that resulted in the spaceplane breaking up and crashing to the ground in pieces. The test used a new fuel mixture formulation for the first time…
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Stratolaunch introduce Rutan designed air-launched system for Falcon rockets
Funded as a Paul G. Allen project under the banner of Stratolaunch, Burt Rutan is taking his space tourism concept a step further, by developing an air-launch system for payloads in the 10,000lbm class into Low Earth Orbit (LEO). The system will be able to launch from several possible operational sites and eventually aims to…