Virgin Galactic launches commercial flights for space tourists

LOS ANGELES - For years, British billionaire Richard Branson vowed that commercial space flights with his firm Virgin Galactic were just around the corner, reported tca/dpa.

On Thursday, that hype finally became reality when three Italian researchers boarded the VSS Unity space plane as Virgin Galactic's first paying passengers and flew about four minutes in suborbital space.

The researchers - Col Walter Villadei and Lt Col. Angelo Landolfi of the Italian Air Force and Pantaleone Carlucci, an engineer with the National Research Council of Italy - spent their precious minutes in microgravity conducting scientific research on topics ranging from cognitive performance to physiological responses in space.

The carrier aircraft and the attached VSS Unity space plane took off from the Spaceport America launch site around 7:30 am (1430 GMT) Pacific time near Truth and Consequences, New Mexico, and climbed to an altitude of about 13,716 metres. By 8:30 am, the carrier aircraft released the space plane, which rocketed to the edge of space.

A live stream of the flight showed the researchers strapped into their seats as they travelled at Mach 2, with one researcher puffing out his breath in visible O's. At 8:31 am, the space plane's motor cut off and the researchers were free to move around. Villadei was the only researcher to get out of his seat, and he propelled himself to the back of the craft where he tended to experiments on a stationary rack. The other two researchers stayed in their seats, hurriedly looking at their tablets.

By 8:35 am, everyone was back in their seats. The craft touched down back in New Mexico around 8:44 am.

Prior to Thursday's flight, only Branson and Virgin Galactic employees had flown aboard the space plane. As of last year, the company had received reservations for nearly 800 tickets and collected US$103.3 million in deposits and membership fees from "future astronauts," according to Virgin Galactic's most recent annual report.

A seat on Virgin Galactic's space plane now costs US$450,000, up from the initial price of US$200,000 that early enthusiasts paid.

Thursday's mission high above the New Mexico desert showcased a part of the space tourism market not often discussed - research flights.

While space tourism is more commonly associated with wealthy passengers achieving lifelong dreams of spaceflight, companies like Virgin Galactic and Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin have also touted suborbital spaceflight as an opportunity for scientists to conduct their own experiments in a microgravity environment.

Performing experiments in orbital space is not really an option, with the cost and time needed to prepare for intensive spaceflight likely outweighing the benefits. Scientists can also send their experiments to the International Space Station, but they cannot tend to them themselves.

Virgin Galactic chief executive Michael Colglazier nodded to the company's dual revenue streams in a statement released before the flight, noting that the company's "two dynamic products" are scientific research and private astronaut flights. - BERNAMA-TCA-DPA