The first tourist suborbital flight of the Unity space plane built by Virgin Galactic is scheduled to take place on June 27. Representatives of the Italian Air Force should go to the limit of space on it.
Virgin Galactic announces the date of the first flight
On Wednesday, May 15, representatives of Richard Branson‘s Virgin Galactic company announced that the first commercial flight of their Unity space plane will take place on June 27. If on this day, for some reason, the start will not be possible, it will take place from the 28th to the 30th of the month.
VSS Unity is a suborbital vehicle designed for two pilots and six passengers. It is raised into the sky by the carrier aircraft VMS Eve. Together they rise to a height of 15 thousand meters. There, the space plane detaches, turns on its jet engine and makes a journey to the edge of space.
The mission, which will take place on June 27, will be called Galactic 01 and will essentially be a research mission. Its passengers will be three representatives of the Italian Air Force and the National Research Council of this country. The purpose of the flight will be to demonstrate the capabilities of VSS Unity as a research laboratory.
What will happen next?
Now the VSS Unity spaceplane, which has been developed since the mid-2000s, has managed to carry out 5 test flights. One of them was attended by the founder of Virgin Galactic, Richard Branson. After that, there was a fairly long break, which the engineers used to improve the characteristics of the spacecraft.
On May 25, the space plane made its last flight to date. Then there were representatives of the company on board. If the first commercial flight on June 27 also turns out to be successful, then the second mission, which will be called Virgin Galactic, should take place in early August.
In the future, such flights will take place once a month. However, the company is already developing a new modification of the space plane called Delta, which will be able to fly once a week. The company sold the first tickets for its ships more than 15 years ago, therefore, the queue of those wishing is quite large.
According to www.space.com
Follow us on Twitter to get the most interesting space news in time
https://twitter.com/ust_magazine
