Virgin Galactic's final test flight a success - Breaking The News

Virgin Galactic's final test flight a success

25 May

1 min read

VIRGIN GALACTIC

Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic VSS Unity 25 mission completed a successful test flight on Thursday, the final one before the company starts flying commercial passengers.

The spaceplane VSS Unity and carrier mothership VMS Eve lifted off at 11:16 am ET from Spaceport America in New Mexico. The rocket-powered spaceship detached at an altitude of about 12 kilometers and took its six crew members to the space boundary, climbing more than 80 kilometers above the Earth's surface.

VSS Unity turned into a glider after spending about 3 minutes in space, landing at 12:38 pm ET, with the company tweeting: "Touchdown, VSS Unity! Our crew and spaceship are back on Earth after landing smoothly." This marks the fifth Virgin Galactic spaceflight.

space exploration branson virgin galactic

NASA-Roscosmos team lifts off from Kazakhstan to ISS

8 April

NASA astronaut Jonny Kim and Roscosmos cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Alexey Zubritsky were launched successfully to the International Space Station (ISS) on Tuesday aboard a Russian Soyuz MS-27 spacecraft. The launch took place from the Russia-leased Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan using a Soyuz booster rocket.The multinational crew is expected to dock with the ISS about four hours after liftoff. They will spend approximately eight months...

Branson: Market reaction to US tariffs 'preventable'

7 April

Billionaire and Virgin Galactic Holdings Inc. founder Richard Branson wrote in a post on X on Monday that the market's reaction to the United States' reciprocal tariffs was "predictable" but also "preventable.""Even if you agree with the premise of these tariffs, every reasonable effort should be made to give US companies sufficient time to adapt. The opposite has happened, and now financial markets everywhere are in free fall, with catastrophic results...

SpaceX crew returns after orbiting Earth for 4 days

4 April

SpaceX's Fram 2 mission returned to Earth on Friday after orbiting the planet's poles for almost four days in the company's Dragon crew vehicle.The crew members, Chun Wang, Jannicke Mikkelsen, Rabea Rogge and Eric Philips, splashed down in the Pacific Ocean, near the coast of Oceanside, California, after being the first crewed mission in polar orbit, which was also the first time that any of the four crew members went to space. The crew's main parachutes...

SpaceX launches 1st crewed mission to orbit Earth's poles

1 April

SpaceX's Fram2 mission has taken flight, sending a crew of four private astronauts to orbit around Earth's polar regions. This will be the first Dragon human spaceflight mission to end with a splashdown off California's coast. The mission also includes testing new technology and features designed to enhance future space travel. The crew will also test laser-based communications using Starlink, accessing the internet through a router in the cargo area.

This website uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience. Our Terms of Use and Data Protection Policy explain the data we collect, why we collect them, and how we may share them.