Virgin Galactic sends astronauts briefly into space

Virgin Galactic has successfully completed its second fully-crewed flight, sending astronauts briefly into space.

The launch: The rocket plane “Unity” was released from a carrier aircraft and soared up to 54.2 miles above Earth in New Mexico desert, enough for a brief weightless experience.
* This was the company’s first flight in nearly two years, with a crew comprised solely of Virgin Galactic employees.

Background: Virgin Galactic, Richard Branson’s company, uses rocket-powered planes to reach the edge of the atmosphere, rather than rocket-launched space capsules like other companies.
* The program has faced challenges, such as a pilot’s death in a 2014 test flight and a brief grounding by the FAA in 2021 for deviating from its scheduled flight path.

Financial struggles: The company’s stock price has decreased in the past year, and its sister company, Virgin Orbit, declared bankruptcy earlier this spring.
* Virgin Galactic plans to begin regular commercial operations in June.

View original article on NPR

This summary was created by an AI system. The use of this summary is subject to our Terms of Service.

Contact us about this post

Posted

in

by

Tags:

Comments

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *