{"id":19550,"date":"2015-12-04T00:09:17","date_gmt":"2015-12-03T16:09:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/virgin-galactic-gets-a-747-jet-to-serve-as-flying-launch-pad-for-its-launcherone-rocket\/"},"modified":"2015-12-04T00:09:17","modified_gmt":"2015-12-03T16:09:17","slug":"virgin-galactic-gets-a-747-jet-to-serve-as-flying-launch-pad-for-its-launcherone-rocket","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/virgin-galactic-gets-a-747-jet-to-serve-as-flying-launch-pad-for-its-launcherone-rocket\/","title":{"rendered":"Virgin Galactic gets a 747 jet to serve as flying launch pad for its LauncherOne rocket"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_215404\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-215404\" style=\"width: 630px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-215404 size-full-width\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/151203-launcher-630x333.jpg\" alt=\"Virgin Galactic 747\" width=\"630\" height=\"333\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/151203-launcher-630x333.jpg 630w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/151203-launcher-1240x656.jpg 1240w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/151203-launcher.jpg 1727w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 630px) 100vw, 630px\"><figcaption data-nosnippet=\"\" id=\"caption-attachment-215404\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">An artist\u2019s conception shows a Virgin Galactic 747 jet carrying a LauncherOne rocket. (Credit: Virgin Galactic)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Virgin Galactic showed off its latest mothership today: a Boeing 747-400 jet that it acquired from its corporate cousins at Virgin Atlantic to serve as the platform for its LauncherOne rocket.<\/p>\n<p>LauncherOne is designed to be launched from a high-flying carrier airplane and send small-scale satellites into orbit. It will use a liquid-fueled engine called Newton, which is still under development. The launch system is expected to be in operation by 2018, and it\u2019s already been tapped by OneWeb to help put a global Internet constellation into orbit.<\/p>\n<p>It was previously thought that LauncherOne would use Virgin Galactic\u2019s WhiteKnightTwo carrier plane. That\u2019s the mothership being used for SpaceShipTwo, Virgin Galactic\u2019s rocket-powered passenger space plane. But Virgin Galactic said the 747 was more suited for LauncherOne\u2019s upgraded payload capacity and flight rate.<\/p>\n<p>The jet, delivered to Virgin in 2001 and&nbsp;nicknamed \u201cCosmic Girl,\u201d was previously used in commercial service. The repurposed&nbsp;airplane was unveiled today in San Antonio. In its new incarnation, it will retain the Cosmic Girl mascot that\u2019s also used on WhiteKnightTwo and SpaceShipTwo.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m absolutely thrilled that Cosmic Girl can stay in the Virgin family&nbsp;\u2014 and truly live up to her name,\u201d Virgin founder Richard Branson said in a news release.<\/p>\n<p>https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=L2OT8Fvo1zw&#038;feature=youtu.be<\/p>\n<p>The shift to a 747 frees up WhiteKnightTwo to be used exclusively for SpaceShipTwo flights, the company said.<\/p>\n<p>The first SpaceShipTwo was destroyed in October 2014 during a test flight in which the co-pilot was killed and the pilot was seriously injured. An investigation traced the cause of that tragedy to a combination of human error, equipment design, training lapses and regulatory gaps. A second SpaceShipTwo is currently under construction, with flight tests expected to begin next year.<\/p>\n<p>Eventually, SpaceShipTwo is due to carry passengers to the edge of outer space. About 700 customers have signed up so far, paying as much as $250,000 per seat. In the wake of last year\u2019s accident, Virgin Galactic has&nbsp;shied away from predicting the time frame for the start of commercial operations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An artist\u2019s conception shows a Virgin Galactic 747 jet carrying a LauncherOne rocket. (Credit: Virgin Galactic) Virgin Galactic showed off its latest mothership today: a Boeing 747-400 jet that it acquired from its corporate cousins at Virgin Atlantic to serve as the platform for its LauncherOne rocket. LauncherOne is designed to be launched from a [&hellip;]<\/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":[291,1550,1973,492],"class_list":["post-19550","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-commercial-space","tag-launcherone","tag-spaceshiptwo","tag-virgin-galactic"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19550"}],"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=19550"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19550\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19550"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19550"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19550"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}