Human Spaceflight Programs Codexery

Virgin Galactic

Commercial spaceflight company offering suborbital tourist flights.

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Virgin Galactic is a British-American spaceflight company that provides suborbital spaceflights to space tourists.[1][2] White Knight Two, a carrier airplane, is used to air-launch Virgin Galactic's suborbital spacecraft from beneath it.[2] By 2026, a dozen Virgin Galactic flights, all conducted with the VSS Unity spaceship since 2018, have gone beyond 50 miles in altitude.[2]

Key facts and history

Richard Branson and the Virgin Group conglomerate, which holds an 11.9% interest via Virgin Investments Limited, established the company.[1] The project's initial suborbital space flight occurred on 13 December 2018, when VSS Unity climbed to 82.7 km.[3] Public ticket sales for Virgin Galactic commenced in February 2022, with each seat priced at $450,000.[4] June 2023 saw the maiden commercial voyage, designated Galactic 01.[4]

On 28 October 2019, Virgin Galactic became the first publicly traded space tourism company when it began trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker 'SPCE'.[5] Through a SPAC merger listing, the enterprise secured $450 million, and its post-listing market capitalization exceeded $2.4 billion.[5]

What the cited sources add

The same source stated that the flight was the first crewed flight to space from US soil since the Space Shuttle retired in 2011.[6] The Manufacturer reported that the XB-1 supersonic demonstrator would fly with General Electric engines, Honeywell avionics, and TenCate carbon fiber.[7] The Guardian reported that at the time of its stock market listing, Virgin Galactic asserted it had over 600 customer reservations, with roughly $80 million in total collected deposits.[8]

References

  1. Wikipedia, "Virgin Galactic" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Virgin Galactic Holdings, Inc. SEC Sch 13D", 10 November 2021 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  2. Wikipedia, "Virgin Galactic" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Wattles, "Meet the pilots of Virgin Galactic's first flight to space", CNN Business, 15 December 2018 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  3. Wikipedia, "Virgin Galactic" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Branson's Virgin Galactic successfully reaches space", BBC, 13 December 2018 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  4. Wikipedia, "Virgin Galactic" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Prang, "You Can Now Sign Up to Go to Space With Virgin Galactic", Wall Street Journal, 2022-02-15; "Blue Origin to increase New Shepard launches in 2022", 18 February 2022; Sheetz, "Virgin Galactic sets first commercial space tourism flight for this month; shares spike more than 30%", CNBC, 2023-06-15; Sheetz, "Virgin Galactic spaceflight live updates: First paying customers set for space in key step for tourism", CNBC, 29 June 2023; Foust, "Virgin Galactic plans higher mothership flight rate with next-generation spaceplanes", SpaceNews en.wikipedia.org
  5. Wikipedia, "Virgin Galactic" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Virgin Galactic launches (on the New York stock exchange)", The Guardian, 2019-10-28 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  6. Wattles, "Meet the pilots of Virgin Galactic's first flight to space", CNN Business, 15 December 2018. facts only, no text reused. edition.cnn.com
  7. Aiden Burgess, "Boom Technology reveals commercial supersonic aircraft prototype with support from Virgin", The Manufacturer, 22 November 2016. facts only, no text reused. themanufacturer.com
  8. "Virgin Galactic launches (on the New York stock exchange)", The Guardian, 2019-10-28. facts only, no text reused. theguardian.com

Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article Virgin Galactic (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.

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Sources

Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.

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