Tag: SpaceShipTwo

NTSB: Pilot Error a Major Factor in the Loss of SpaceShipTwo

NTSB: Pilot Error a Major Factor in the Loss of SpaceShipTwo

Only two days in to an investigation which was expected to take up to a year,  the National Safety Transportation Board team looking in to Friday’s Virgin Galactic crash at the Mojave spaceport has made a surprising discovery, one which overturns almost all of the early assumptions about what led to the disaster. Speaking at […]

Looking Back, Looking Ahead and Getting the Business of “Rocket Science” Right

Looking Back, Looking Ahead and Getting the Business of “Rocket Science” Right

Still Working…Still Waiting. Image Credit: Virgin Galactic Saturday, October 4th, 2014 was the ten year anniversary of the SpaceShipOne’s winning the Ansari X-Prize, a feat which built on its legacy of becoming the first privately funded, piloted “rocket” to pass the 62.5 mile high Karman line and go into suborbital space. Ten years later, on […]

Posted in: Space Tourism
Virgin Galactic: More Delays, More Opportunities

Virgin Galactic: More Delays, More Opportunities

Image Credit Virgin Galactic Confirming a schedule slip which comes as no surprise, Virgin Galactic is now estimating that the first passenger flight (with founder Richard Branson aboard) will not take place until February or March of 2015. 2015.  The comments from the flamboyant businessman and adventurer came during an appearance with David Letterman on […]

Posted in: NASA, NewSpace, Space Tourism
IXV: Europe’s Experimental Space Plane

IXV: Europe’s Experimental Space Plane

IXV Undergoing Ocean Retrieval Tests Sierra Nevada’s Dream Chaser is far from the only space plane currently under development.  With the second super secretive Boeing X-37 still in orbit, and a variety of suborbital craft;  Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo,  XCOR’s Lynx and Swiss Space Systems SOAR space plane all in various stages of construction,  the Shuttle […]

XCOR Receives Capital Investment

XCOR Receives Capital Investment

Following the delivery of its first flight capable, pressurized cockpit earlier this year, XCOR continues to make steady progress in assembling its two seat Lynx sub-orbital space plane. With fellow intended space tourism provider Virgin Galactic announcing a switch in fuels for the hybrid rocket motor powering SpaceShipTwo, a change which may further delay its […]

Posted in: Space Tourism, XCOR
One Fast Step, Virgin Galactic Breaks the Sound Barrier with SpaceShipTwo

One Fast Step, Virgin Galactic Breaks the Sound Barrier with SpaceShipTwo

The suborbital space transportation industry took one of its biggest steps to date this morning, with the first powered test flight of Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo, the complete details of which are included in the press release below.  Coming as it does in the same month which saw Orbital Sciences complete the first launch of the Antares booster,   and looking […]

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