By Leah Crane
The VSS Unity crew: Dave Mackay, Colin Bennett, Beth Moses, Richard Branson, Sirisha Bandla and Michael Masucci Virgin Galactic
After years of promises, billionaire Richard Branson whitethorn yet beryllium going to abstraction aboard Virgin Galactic’s abstraction plane. The 11 July ngo planned to transportation him and 3 different passengers volition beryllium the company’s astir ambitious trial to day – but questions stay astir whether oregon not it volition really scope space.
Branson founded Virgin Galactic successful 2004 with a extremity of providing suborbital flights to scientists and abstraction tourists starting successful 2009. Its main trade is SpaceShipTwo, a abstraction level that launches from a larger airplane mid-flight. The craft’s archetypal iteration, the VSS Enterprise, crashed during a 2014 trial flight, sidesplitting 1 aviator and severely injuring the other, truthful the institution paused investigating until 2016.
That year, investigating began connected the VSS Unity, the trade intended to transportation Branson and 3 different Virgin Galactic executives. The upcoming formation volition beryllium the company’s 4th crewed trial formation and the archetypal to transportation passengers beyond the 2 pilots.
However, the question of whether it volition technically scope space is inactive unclear. The highest altitude that the VSS Unity has reached truthful acold is astir 90 kilometres, which counts arsenic abstraction nether the standards of the US authorities but doesn’t scope the commonly utilized planetary modular of the Kármán line, which is 100 kilometres supra Earth’s surface.
Blue Origin, the different large subordinate successful the suborbital formation business, has pointed this out successful statements. Its founder, Jeff Bezos, is planning a travel to space – supra the Kármán enactment – aboard the company’s New Shepard rocket connected 20 July. So if it is simply a existent contention to space, Bezos whitethorn bushed Branson adjacent if Branson flies first.
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