Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic aborts test in its third human spaceflight attempt
A successful flight would have brought the company, founded by Richard Branson in an effort to open space to the masses, a step closer to flying Branson himself to the edge of space, followed by the line of people who have paid as much as $250,000 for the chance to fly on a suborbital mission, see the Earth from space and experience a few minutes of weightlessness.
On Twitter, the company said that the “ignition sequence for the rocket motor did not complete. Vehicle and crew are in great shape. We have several motors ready at Spaceport America. We will check the vehicle and be back to flight soon.”
Instead of operating a traditional rocket that launches vertically from a launchpad, Virgin Galactic takes a different approach. It flies a space plane, known as SpaceShipTwo, that is tethered to the belly of a twin fuselage mothership. On Saturday, the pair took off from the runway at Spaceport America at about 8:24 a.m. Mountain Time and flew to an altitude of some 40,000 feet. Then about 45 minutes later, the space ship was released, and the pilots ignited the rocket motor. There was a bright flash but then it went out and the crew flew back down.
Two pilots were on board, Dave Mackay, a Scottish-born pilot who served in the Royal Air Force, and C.J. Sturckow, a retired Marine Corps Colonel and NASA astronaut who flew four missions on the Space Shuttle.
Virgin Galactic first reached space almost two years ago to the day in a flight that marked the first human spaceflight from United States soil since the Space Shuttle retired in 2011. Then in February 2019 it reached space again this time with a crewmember, Beth Moses, whose title is chief astronaut instructor, in addition to the two pilots.
The company doesn’t reach orbit, rather it flies straight up and down, hitting an altitude of more than 50 miles, the threshold of where space begins, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.
