Speaking with Swedish TV4, the ever-talkative and always optimistic Virgin Galactic CEO Richard Branson was repeatedly “hopeful” on the company’s prospects for launching space tourists from Kiruna:
“I am hopeful that quite soon after that we have started our space program from New Mexico…that hopefully the next base will be in Northern Sweden“.
The British billionaut- and space-priest-to-be was also vaguely bullish on the prospects of intercontinental travel via space:
Ashish Thakkar’s space diary
Arabian Business
Dubai-based entrepreneur Ashish Thakkar, CEO of Kensington Real Estate, is in training at the NASTAR center near Philadelphia for his flight aboard Virgin Galactic. He’s keeping an online journal:
“Now we are taken to experience G force hands on in the machine! It’s difficult to describe this but is the closest thing to going into space and is seriously amazing…
“While I’ve known for months now that I’m going into space, today I really felt it. Virgin’s organisation, attention to detail and hospitality makes a real difference; and most importantly, the actual training is just out of this world - quite literally! Virgin is genuinely giving us an incredible experience.”
Blasting off with Richard Branson
CNN Money
“The entrepreneur is one of 250 people who have signed on for a $200,000 seat on Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo, which will transport passengers into sub-orbital space, roughly 68 miles above earth.
“‘This is like a dream come true,’ says Wrocherinsky, founder and CEO of Infinity Info Systems, a CRM technology consultancy based in New York City.”
Speaking in Edinburgh this week, Virgin Galactic chief Will Whitehorn predicted that space flights could begin from his native Scotland within five to six years, The Scotsman reports:
“Mr Whitehorn said space flights from RAF Lossiemouth in Moray in 2013-14 could follow the first Virgin Galactic trips from New Mexico in two years’ time. Test flights from the Mojave Desert on the US west coast begin in two weeks.”
Continue reading ‘Whitehorn: Virgin Galactic to Fly from Lossiemouth in Scotland by 2014′
If you have been wondering why Virgin Galactic’s WhiteKnightTwo has yet to fly despite being rolled out three months ago, wonder no longer. Apparently the vehicle was unfinished when it was unveiled in July, lacking almost everything that was required to actually fly. Like power, avionics and…oh yes…landing gear.
Richard Branson interview - Stars in his eyes
Scotland on Sunday
“So far, 80,000 people have registered an interest in being among the six passengers for the inaugural Virgin Galactic trip, and 286 have paid deposits, including physicist Stephen Hawking, the environmentalist James Lovelock and former Dallas actress Victoria Principal.
“‘We are now holding $40m in deposits from a huge range of people,’ says [Virgin Galactic President Will] Whitehorn. ‘In July we unveiled White Knight Two, the world’s largest carbon-fibre aircraft, in the Mojave desert, California. By the time this article is in print we will have begun months of test flights. The next stage is the actual aircraft, which we will unveil next summer, ahead of our first commercial flights to space by early 2010.’”
Super-rich take ultimate flight from credit crunch - into space
Daily Mail
The company said it has sold 11 tickets - costing a whopping $200,000 (£122,000) each - in October. Virgin Galactic president Will Whitehorn said: ‘We normally sell about six or seven a month, so this is a big increase. Maybe the super rich are having to liquidate their positions and don’t know what to do with the cash.’
The mothership of SpaceShipTwo is expected to take to the skies for test flights within the next three weeks, according to reports out of the International Symposium for Personal and Commercial Spaceflight in Las Cruces, NM.
The first flight of WhiteKnightTwo will take place more than two months after the aircraft was first rolled out amid much fanfare at the Scaled Composites production facility in Mojave, CA.
LiveScience and the Las Cruces Sun-News have more details.
Virgin Galactic ready to sign spaceport deal
Las Cruces Sun News
“The state’s spaceport agency is on the verge of signing a formal development agreement with Virgin Galactic, the British firm with plans to base its space tourism operations at Spaceport America.
“The agreement has been finalized and could be signed as early as today, New Mexico Spaceport Authority Executive Director Steve Landeene said Tuesday.
“Landeene said the only delay to signing is Virgin Galactic designating who will act as the firm’s signator.”
Jumping Off Point for the ‘Final Frontier’
Inverness Courier
“A few weeks ago, a spokesman for Sir Richard Branson’s company Virgin Galactic confirmed that it has chosen Scotland as the venue for a spaceport. In the shortlist of sites, the front runner is Lossiemouth. Kinloss and Machrihanish are also under consideration.
“If these plans come to reality there is a 60 per cent chance that the shores of the Moray Firth will become this country’s portal into space by as early as 2013, only five years away.”
India plans new manned rocket launch pad
Flight International
“The Indian Space Research Organisation plans to build a third launch pad at its Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) in Sriharikota island on India’s eastern coast for its proposed 2015 manned flight.”
National Geographic Uses G-Force One to Film Station Identifications
National Geographic broadcasts ‘zero gravity’ idents
Design Week
“National Geographic is today broadcasting what it claims are the world’s first channel idents filmed in zero gravity, developed by Brothers & Sisters.The idents will be used as promos for National Geographic’s Space Week, launching in January.
“The advertising consultancy, which was commissioned in April on the strength of an [...]
XCOR Introduces First Space Tourist, Says Demand High
Their thunder stolen by a leak to The Daily Mail, XCOR introduced its first space tourist, London-based banker Per Wimmer, and said that it has 22 reservations for suborbital flights aboard its Lynx vehicle beginning in 2011.
Vanna Bonta - Space Sexologist
I’m sitting here watching an episode of “The Universe” on The History Channel and guess who pops up on the screen but novelist/poet/actress-turned-citizen-of-the-cosmos Vanna Bonta. She’s apparently working on a flight suit that will allow for easier sexual couplings in microgravity.
There’s a segment showing her and husband Allen Newcome testing their 2suit aboard Zero G’s [...]
NASA Extends Contract for Soyuz Transport to ISS
NASA PRESS RELEASE
NASA has signed a $141 million modification to the current International Space Station contract with the Russian Federal Space Agency for crew transportation services planned through the spring of 2012.
Progress Report: JP Inflates Ascender 100 Vehicle
JP Aerospace has posted updated photos of the inflation of its Ascender 100 airship. The company is working on creating lighter-than-air vehicles that can float into space.
Chiao: Deepen U.S., China Cooperation in Space
Former NASA Astronaut Leroy Chiao makes the case for space cooperation between the United States and China on his blog.
“It makes sense politically and programmatically to cooperate with China, in all areas. Space would be a good place to symbolically signal such a shift in policy. The United States did this with Russia in the [...]
