Virgin Galactic Founder Richard Branson with Marsha Waters, the 600th ticketholder on SpaceShipTwo. (Credit: The Virgin Group)
LONDON (VIRGIN GALACTIC PR) – Sir Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group and Virgin Galactic, announced Monday, June 17, that the company’s 600th Future Astronaut is Marsha Waters, the owner of an accounting services company based in Blackpool, United Kingdom. Waters, 42, embodies the next generation of women in space: private individuals who are passionate about experiencing space travel for themselves.
Waters first took an interest in Virgin Galactic in 2010 and has been following its progress ever since.
Rupert “I know NOTH-THING!” Murdoch’s always entertaining and occasionally reliable British tabloid, The Sun, reports the latest celebritynaut rumor: Ashton Kutcher and main squeeze Mila Kunis will honeymoon aboard Sir Richard Branson’s SpaceShipTwo next year after getting married this September, probably on a beach in St Tropez.
All this according to an anonymous pal of the Hollywood power couple:
A pal of the pair said: “They decided together they want their big day in September, probably on one of St Tropez’s beaches.
“Ashton is already going into space on Branson’s Virgin Galactic flight and he has said Mila will definitely be at his side as his honeymoon present.”
The pair agreed they want to get hitched as soon as possible while sunning themselves in St Tropez with new pals Princess Beatrice and her boyfriend Dave Clark. Ashton won’t have to pull many strings to get Mila on to the space voyage.
Dave is head of “astronaut relations” for the Virgin Galactic programme — and he got friendly with Ashton when the actor snapped up the 500th ticket for the first flights.
WASHINGTON (NASA PR)– NASA has selected 21 space technology payloads for flights on commercial reusable launch vehicles, balloons, and a commercial parabolic aircraft.
This latest selection represents the sixth cycle of NASA’s continuing call for payloads through an announcement of opportunity. More than 100 technologies with test flights now have been facilitated through NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate’s Flight Opportunities Program.
WASHINGTON, D.C. (Sen. Bill Nelson PR) - Not just tourism, but university classes in space are right around the corner. That’s what came to light in testimony today at a U.S. Senate hearing on the looming commercial uses of space.
In fact, at least one well-known American university already has made a down payment on a Virgin Galactic flight. That’s the company that just two weeks ago launched SpaceShip Two and completed its first rocket-powered flight.
“Purdue has a down payment on a spot on a Virgin Galactic science flight,” Dr. Steven Collicott testified at Thursday’s Senate hearing. “ … And I do look forward to the day a potential Ph.D. student walks into my office and says, “Well, professor, I flew into space for my Master’s degree. What do you have to offer?”
Some morning highlights of the first day of the Next-generation Suborbital Researchers Conference 2013 here in Broomfield, Colo.:
Addressing the group via video, NASA Deputy Administrator Lori Garver said NASA is not excluding the possibility that the Flight Opportunities program would fund human researchers on suborbital fights. Previously, NASA had said it would purchase flights for payloads but not for researchers to fly.
Garver provided no details on precisely what safety standards the space agency would require prior to paying for researchers to fly.
NASA has spent $29.5 million on the Flight Opportunities program over the past three years, and it has requested an additional $15 million for FY2014. In 2010, Garver addressed the first NSRC and said NASA would seek $15 million per year over 5 years, but the agency has not received all the funding it requested.
The deputy administrator also announced plans for a joint solicitation for science and tech payloads to be issued by NASA’s Science and Space Tech directorates. The solicitation is expected to be pushed in late summer or early fall.
XCOR Chief Operating Officer Andrew Nelson said that while satellites have been removed from the U.S. Munitions List in draft regulations, crew spacecraft have been added to it. Calling the decision a major step backward, Nelson urged urged audience members to oppose this move during the on-going public comments period.
Virgin Galactic Vice President for Special Projects Will Pomerantz said the company has taken reservations for nearly 600 people worldwide for flights aboard the company’s SpaceShipTwo suborbital vehicles.
Pomerantz added that NanoRacks has delivered the first payload racks for flying experiments aboard the space plane.
Vasily Klyukin, a 37-year-old Russian real estate mogul who lives in Monaco, will spend $1.5 million to take a flight into space alongside “Titanic” star Leonardo DiCaprio aboard Sir Richard Branson’s SpaceShipTwo.
“I want to be a bit daring,” Klyukin told Reuters. “I will have to give up smoking now for sure!”
Klyukin won the trip at the amfAR Cinema Against AIDS charity dinner during the Cannes Film Festival. Two more seats on the same flight were auctioned off for an additional $2.3 million.
Seats on Virgin Galactic flights now cost $250,000 apiece.
WhiteKnightTwo was out flying around solo this morning without SpaceShipTwo.
Scaled Composites has a RocketMotorTwo engine out on the test stand along with the mobile nitrous oxide tanker. No word yet on whether they tested earlier today or are still setting up for a hot fire later on.
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