{"id":13326,"date":"2019-02-22T19:53:50","date_gmt":"2019-02-22T11:53:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/virgin-galactic-stages-second-piloted-spaceflight\/"},"modified":"2019-02-22T19:53:50","modified_gmt":"2019-02-22T11:53:50","slug":"virgin-galactic-stages-second-piloted-spaceflight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/virgin-galactic-stages-second-piloted-spaceflight\/","title":{"rendered":"Virgin Galactic stages second piloted spaceflight"},"content":{"rendered":"

STORY WRITTEN FOR CBS NEWS & USED WITH PERMISSION<\/p>\n

\"\"
Virgin Galactic chief pilot Dave Mackay and co-pilot Michael \u201cSooch\u201d Masucci at the controls of SpaceShipTwo during Friday\u2019s test flight. Virgin Galactic\u2019s chief astronaut instructor, Beth Moses, accompanied the pilots on the flight to the edge of space. Credit: Virgin Galactic<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Two test pilots and their instructor flew Virgin Galactic\u2019s winged spaceplane out of the discernible atmosphere Friday for the second time in nine weeks, a successful sub-orbital flight that moves Richard Branson\u2019s company one step closer to its goal of launching paying passengers and payloads on brief forays into the weightlessness of space.<\/p>\n

Running two days late because of high winds, Virgin\u2019s SpaceShipTwo rocketplane, also known as VSS Unity, was carried aloft from the Mojave Air & Space Port north of Los Angeles by a twin-fuselage carrier jet known as WhiteKnightTwo.<\/p>\n

After the air and spacecraft were off the ground, Virgin Galactic revealed that chief pilot Dave Mackay and co-pilot Mike \u201cSooch\u201d Masucci were joined by Beth Moses, the company\u2019s chief astronaut instructor.<\/p>\n

A few minutes later, around 11:50 a.m. EST (GMT-5), SpaceShipTwo was released from the carrier jet and a few moments later, Mackay and Masucci ignited the spacecraft\u2019s hybrid rocket motor to begin a steep near-vertical climb out of the thick lower atmosphere.<\/p>\n

It was the fifth supersonic flight of the futuristic-looking spaceplane and the 16th overall since a catastrophic 2014 in-flight breakup that destroyed an earlier version of the spacecraft and killed one of its two pilots. Friday\u2019s flight was the company\u2019s second featuring a long-duration rocket firing.<\/p>\n

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SpaceShipTwo fires its rocket motor during Friday\u2019s test flight. Credit: Virgin Galactic \/ MarsScientific.com \/ Trumbull Studios<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Branson, who was not on site for the test, said earlier he hopes testing will be complete in time for him to fly into space himself on July 20, the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing. But he said meeting an arbitrary target will not drive the test schedule and that commercial operations will not begin until all aspects of testing are complete.<\/p>\n

\u201cHaving Beth fly in the cabin today, starting to ensure that our customer journey is as flawless as the spaceship itself, brings a huge sense of anticipation and excitement to all of us here who are looking forward to experiencing space for ourselves,\u201d Branson said in a statement. \u201cThe next few months promise to be the most thrilling yet.\u201d<\/p>\n

Friday\u2019s flight appeared to go off without a hitch as the pilots guided the vehicle out of the discernible atmosphere. The rocket motor shut down normally about a minute after ignition and the spacecraft coasted upward at a Virgin record 3.04 times the speed of sound to an altitude of 55.87 miles, or 295,007 feet.<\/p>\n

For comparison, NASA pilot Joe Walker flew the air-launched X-15 rocketplane to an altitude of 67.1 miles on Aug. 22, 1963, the highest point ever achieved by the legendary aircraft, 17 miles above the 50-mile altitude the Air Force considers the \u201cboundary\u201d of space.<\/p>\n

SpaceShipTwo made its first trip into space Dec. 13, reaching an altitude of 51.4 miles. The two pilots, Mark Stucky and C.J. Sturckow, a former space shuttle commander, were awarded commercial astronaut wings by the Federal Aviation Administration and their rocket motor was put on display at the Smithsonian\u2019s National Air and Space Museum.<\/p>\n

Mackay and Masucci flew a similar flight profile Friday, but SpaceShipTwo was rigged more like it will be or commercial flights and the motor fired slightly longer, pushing the vehicle to a higher altitude. And they had a passenger of sorts in Moses.<\/p>\n

As the spacecraft arced over at the top of its trajectory, the crew experienced about five minutes of weightlessness as they enjoyed a view of Earth\u2019s curved horizon and the deep black of space. Moses had time to unstrap and float about the cabin.<\/p>\n

\u201cBeth floated free to complete a number of cabin evaluation test points,\u201d Virgin said in a post-flight statement. \u201cThe human validation of data previously collected via sensors, and the live testing of other physical elements of the cabin interior, are fundamental to the provision of a safe but enjoyable customer experience.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before plunging back to Earth, the pilots raised the vehicle\u2019s twin tail booms to an angle of 60 degrees, a maneuver known as \u201cfeathering,\u201d that increases atmospheric drag and eases aerodynamic stress.<\/p>\n

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SpaceShipTwo took off with its carrier airplane from Mojave Air and Space Port, California. Credit: Virgin Galactic<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cBeth, Sooch and I just enjoyed a pretty amazing flight which was beyond anything any of us has ever experienced,\u201d Mackay said in a statement. \u201cIt was thrilling yet smooth and nicely controlled throughout with a view at the top, of the Earth from space, which exceeded all our expectations.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor the three of us today this was the fulfillment of lifelong ambitions, but paradoxically is also just the beginning of an adventure which we can\u2019t wait to share with thousands of others.\u201d<\/p>\n

The feather concept was the brainchild of legendary aircraft designer Burt Rutan. With financing from Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, Rutan\u2019s company at the time, Scaled Composites, carried out the first privately funded sub-orbital spaceflight in 2004 to win the $10 million Ansari X Prize.<\/p>\n

Branson then arranged to use a scaled-up version of the design and founded Virgin Galactic, which eventually took over development and commercial flight operations.<\/p>\n

During Friday\u2019s flight, the feathering procedure worked normally and after rotating the tail booms back to their normal position, Mackay and Masucci flew a normal gliding approach to a runway landing back at the Mojave Air & Space Port.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe team\u2019s overriding priority is always to bring crew and spaceship home safely,\u201d Virgin said in a pre-flight statement. \u201cWhether we complete all our objectives during the next flight or not, we remain committed to completing the final stages of flight test as quickly, but more importantly as safely, as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

STORY WRITTEN FOR CBS NEWS & USED WITH PERMISSION Virgin Galactic chief pilot Dave Mackay and co-pilot Michael \u201cSooch\u201d Masucci at the controls of SpaceShipTwo during Friday\u2019s test flight. Virgin Galactic\u2019s chief astronaut instructor, Beth Moses, accompanied the pilots on the flight to the edge of space. Credit: Virgin Galactic Two test pilots and their instructor flew […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2707,291,1704,2708,2212,493,1973,492],"class_list":["post-13326","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-beth-moses","tag-commercial-space","tag-dave-mackay","tag-mike-masucci","tag-mojave-air-and-space-port","tag-space-tourism","tag-spaceshiptwo","tag-virgin-galactic"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13326"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13326"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13326\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13326"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13326"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13326"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}