At this point, Spaceshiptwo separates from WhiteKnightTwo
and ignites its rocket motor to complete the rest of the voyage.
Spaceshiptwo is a commercial version of SpaceShipOne,
the first private spacecraft to reach the edge of space in 2004.
Virgin Galactic uses a Spaceshiptwo rocket plane, which is
flown up to 15 km under the wings of an airplane.
Spaceshiptwo is the commercial version of SpaceShipOne,
which was the first private spacecraft to reach the edge of space in 2004.
Like Spaceshiptwo, SpaceShipOne was released at a high altitude by a plane,
WhiteKnightOne, and completed the rest of the trip into space.
In a blog post yesterday,
the company emphasized that the new Spaceshiptwo will not be used in test flights any time soon.
While individual components have been tested separately, this will be the first time
Virgin Galactic will be testing Spaceshiptwo's electrical systems and all of its moving parts together.
Tickets on a Spaceshiptwo flight are set at $250,000
and Virgin Galactic has already sold over 700 tickets, more than the total number of people who have ever traveled into space.