Charting Virgin’s customer growth

In a press release Thursday about NASA’s purchase of a SpaceShipTwo flight for research activities, Virgin Galactic provided an update on sales for its primary market, space tourism. “Virgin Galactic has already collected more than $58 million in deposits from 455 future tourist astronauts,” the release noted. Those are the largest figures that the company […]

Virgin Galactic’s upcoming spaceflight plans

Virgin Galactic president and CEO George Whitesides offered Saturday some clarity on the company’s plans to move ahead with the next phase of test flights of its SpaceShipTwo suborbital vehicle. Speaking at the 100 Year Starship Study Symposium in Orlando, Florida, Whitesides noted that SpaceShipTwo has not been in active test flights in recent months […]

Another step forward for SpaceShipTwo’s rocket motor

If you go to Virgin Galactic’s web site today you’ll see a release about the first flight of WhiteKnightTwo by Virgin Galactic chief test pilot David Mackay, which took place yesterday in Mojave. “I was able to fly WhiteKnight through the full extent of its flight envelope—to its maximum altitude, speed and crosswind limit—so it […]

In-flight suborbital Internet access? Maybe not.

One of the nice things about flying on Virgin America (among some other airlines) is having access to the Internet in flight. On one of those long transcontinental flights, it’s great to make the time productive by having access to the web, email, and the like. But what if you’re making a quick trip into […]

Virgin Galactic ramps up SpaceShipTwo testing

SpaceShipTwo during the feathered portion of a glide flight last week. (Clay Center Observatory/Virgin Galactic)

For some time, a long pause in glide tests of Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo raised questions about the progress the company was making, in partnership with Scaled Composites, on development of suborbital spacecraft. After a January 13th glide test, the […]

BBC gets a behind-the-scenes look at SpaceShipTwo

Screenshot of a video report by the BBC's Richard Scott showing the interior of SpaceShipTwo.

BBC reporter Richard Scott has a bit of an exclusive: a look behind the scenes of the development of Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo as well as Spaceport America in New Mexico. The real exclusive is the first look inside SpaceShipTwo, […]

NSRC Day 1 highlights: suborbital research customers, prizes, and vehicle developments

Monday was the first day of the the Next-Generation Suborbital Researchers Conference (NSRC) at the University of Central Florida in Orlando. This conference, the second of its kind, is designed to bring together suborbital vehicle developers and the research community, an emerging market for commercial suborbital reusable vehicles. The conference has attracted more than 300 […]

Branson appealed to keep Homans’ job

The turmoil surrounding the management of Spaceport America in New Mexico has been relatively quiet the last couple of weeks, after the resignation of executive director Rick Homans at the insistence of the new governor, followed by the dismissal of the spaceport’s board of directors early this month. That situation is still in flux, the […]

Space Adventures and Virgin Galactic make a little news in Munich

On Sunday afternoon Eric Anderson, chairman of Space Adventures, and George Whitesides, president and CEO of Virgin Galactic, appeared on a panel at the Digital – Life – Design (DLD) conference in Munich. The half-hour panel, with the rather clunky title “New Space Mission”, was designed to provide attendees of this rather eclectic conference with […]

Virgin’s Will Whitehorn to retire

Virgin Galactic president Will Whitehorn speaks at the Spaceport America runway dedication in October 2010, with Sir Richard Branson looking on. (credit: J. Foust)

Virgin Galactic president Will Whitehorn will retire from the company next month and be replaced by current CEO George Whitesides, the company announced Thursday. Whitehorn, who has been working for […]