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The Spaceship Company opens assembly facility at Mojave Air and Space Port to build Virgin Galactic spaceships
The Spaceship Company (TSC), the aerospace production joint venture of Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic and Scaled Composites, achieved a significant milestone in making commercial space travel a reality with today’s opening of its Final Assembly, Integration and Test Hangar, or FAITH, at Mojave Air and Space Port. The $8 million, modern, energy-efficient hangar supports the final stages of production for prime customer Virgin Galactic’s WhiteKnightTwo and SpaceShipTwo, and will add new jobs to the commercial space industry at spaceports in Mojave and New Mexico.
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Historic First SpaceShipTwo Feathered Flight Completed
SpaceShipTwo's First "Feathered" Flight May 4th 2011
SpaceShipTwo has successfully completed her first "feathered" test flight showing her unique re-entry design. After a 45 minute climb to the desired altitude of 51,500 feet, SS2 was released cleanly from VMS Eve and established a stable glide profile before deploying, for the first time, its re-entry or "feathered" configuration by rotating the tail section of the vehicle upwards to a 65 degree angle to the fuselage.
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Photo by Clay Center Observatory |
 Virgin America and WhiteKnightTwo and SpaceShipTwo Photo by Mark Greenberg |
On the 7th of April in San Francisco Virgin American was seen flying in tandem with WhiteKnightTwo and SpaceShipTwo. This was an inaugural flight celebrating the opening of the new renovated San Francisco Terminal 2. |
Spaceport America’s Runway Dedication Event was held on the 22nd of October with WhiteKnightTwo, with SpaceShipTwo captive, doing several fly-bys including low passes before actually landing on the Spaceport America runway.
10 October 2010 – VSS Enterprise first ever solo glide flight!
VSS Enterprise achieves manned free flight from over 45,000 ft (13,700 metres) and successfully glides in 11 minutes to land at Mojave Air and Spaceport.
Sir Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Group, who was present during the first successful flight, added “This was one of the most exciting days in the whole history of Virgin. For the first time since we seriously began the project in 2004, I watched the world’s first manned commercial spaceship landing on the runway at Mojave Air and Space Port and it was a great moment. Now, the sky is no longer the limit and we will begin the process of pushing beyond to the final frontier of space itself over the next year.”
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July 15th was a significant milestone for Scaled Composites. For the first time VSS Enterprise flew with crew onboard. As planned, the spaceship remained attached to VMS Eve (captive) for the duration of the flight and numerous combined vehicle systems tests were conducted. In addition and for the first time, the two crew members on board VSS Enterprise, evaluated all of the spaceship's systems and functions from end to end in the air. Objectives achieved.
Virgin Galactic announced today that its commercial manned spaceship, VSS Enterprise, this morning successfully completed its first “captive carry” test flight, taking off at 07.05 am (PST) from Mojave Air and Spaceport, California.
The spaceship was unveiled to the public for the first time on December 7th 2009 and named by Governors Schwarzenegger and Richardson. VSS Enterprise remained attached to its unique WhiteKnightTwo carrier aircraft, VMS Eve, for the duration of the 2 hours 54 minutes flight, achieving an altitude of 45,000ft (13716 metres).
Commenting on the historic flight, Burt Rutan said: “This is a momentous day for the Scaled and Virgin Teams. The captive carry flight signifies the start of what we believe will be extremely exciting and successful spaceship flight test program.”Sir Richard Branson, Founder of Virgin Galactic added: “Seeing the finished spaceship in December was a major day for us but watching VSS Enterprise fly for the first time really brings home what beautiful, ground-breaking vehicles Burt and his team have developed for us. It comes as no surprise that the flight went so well; the Scaled team is uniquely qualified to bring this important and incredible dream to reality. Today was another major step along that road and a testament to US engineering and innovation.”
The VSS Enterprise test flight programme will continue though 2010 and 2011, progressing from captive carry to independent glide and then powered flight, prior to the start of commercial operations.
