Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic cuts short test flight from New Mexico spaceport
- Branson’s space tourism company was aiming to send the air-launched Unity space plane to an altitude as high as 50 miles
- For US$250,000 a ticket, passengers who have signed up for the suborbital flight will ascend some 60 miles above Earth
Virgin Galactic Holdings Inc cut short a test flight of its suborbital SpaceShipTwo Unity plane on Saturday, safely returning its pilots to Spaceport America in New Mexico after the rocket motor’s ignition sequence failed to complete.
Richard Branson’s space tourism company, which is preparing for commercial flights next year, was aiming to send the air-launched Unity space plane to an altitude as high as 50 miles to test its cabin experience and boosters in-flight.
The suborbital space plane was carried to an altitude of roughly 44,000 feet (13,410 metres) by its twin-fuselage mother ship dubbed White Knight 2. It detached from the carrier plane around 9:15am local time, but a live video stream appeared to show the engines firing only for a brief moment.
“The ignition sequence for the rocket motor did not complete,” Virgin Galactic said on Twitter. “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.”
The flight of Unity was intended to gather crucial test data needed to advance its commercial space flight license with the US Federal Aviation Administration before flying customers for the first time next year.