Fifteen years after Virgin Galactic executives inked a 20-year lease at New Mexico's Spaceport America, the space tourism company is preparing to accomplish its long-time goal — flying private astronaut passengers into zero gravity tens of thousands of feet above Earth's surface.
That's Virgin Galactic's plan Thursday morning, when three passengers and the company's lead astronaut instructor are scheduled to take off from the southern New Mexico spaceport at 9 a.m. If Thursday's flight matches Virgin Galactic's first commercial mission June 29, then the four-person crew will be in the air for about an hour and a half and reach a peak altitude of over 50 miles.
Virgin plans to livestream the flight on its website, where there's a link to sign up for the stream and other live flight updates.
This week's flight marks the biggest milestone for Virgin Galactic (NYSE: SPCE), founded by Sir Richard Branson in 2004. The company's mission is to give customers a "unique, multi-day, transformative experience," according to documents filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Aug. 13, 2020.
"Private commercial space travel has been limited to a select group of individuals who were able to reach space, generally only at great personal expense and risk. We are planning to change that," the SEC filing reads. "We believe a significant market opportunity exists to provide high net worth individuals with a dynamic spaceflight experience at a fraction of the expense incurred by other private individuals to date."
Virgin Galactic opened ticket sales for seats on board VSS Unity in February 2022. Those tickets cost $450,000 total, but general sales are currently closed as the company works through a backlog of around 800 people with reservations lined up. Tickets are, however, currently available through a partnership with Virtuoso, a luxury and experiential travel company that Virgin partnered with in July 2022.
During the company's Q2 earnings call Aug. 1, Michael Colglazier, Virgin's CEO, said ticket sales could reopen in "successive tranches" once the company's new class of spaceships, called the Delta-class, is ready for operations. Those ships would allow Virgin to fly more often, and Colglazier added on the call that rolling out tickets in chunks could help keep ticket prices down.
While Virgin Galactic's June 29 research mission with a four-person crew that included two Italian Air Force officers and an Italian researcher kicked off the company's commercial service, tomorrow's planned flight — dubbed "Galactic 02" after June's "Galactic 01" mission — is the first time private astronaut passengers will fly on board VSS Unity, the company's passenger spaceship.
"Galactic 02" will also be the third time Virgin flies people to space in the past four months, following June's "Galactic 02" mission and the company's "Unity 25" mission on May 25, which flew two "mission specialists" to space in order to assess the astronaut experience as the final step in its flight test program.
The four-person crew planned to fly on board VSS Unity Thursday morning includes:
- Jon Goodwin, an 80-year-old man who competed in the 1972 Munich Olympic games.
- Keisha Schahaff and Anastasia Mayers, a mother-daughter duo from the Caribbean county Antigua and Barbuda who won seats on VSS Unity in a draw that raised funds for the nonprofit Space for Humanity, per a July 17 news release from Virgin Galactic.
- Beth Moses, Virgin Galactic's lead astronaut instructor, who will fly to space for the fourth time with Virgin on the "Galactic 02" mission.
CJ Sturckow and Kelly Latimer will co-pilot VSS Unity during "Galactic 02," and Nicola Pecile will pilot Virgin Galactic's "mothership," VMS Eve, on the mission. VMS Eve carries VSS Unity up to around 45,000 feet above southern New Mexico before Unity releases from Eve and fires up its booster rocket to reach space before gliding back to Earth.
"Across the board, whether it be research flights or private astronaut missions, Virgin Galactic is delivering an incomparable experience," Colglazier said during the company's Q2 earnings call. "It is exciting to be flying to space on a regular basis, and we also know that we have many more milestones ahead of us."
On the earnings call, Doug Ahrens, Virgin Galactic's chief financial officer, said the company expects five more spaceflights out of Spaceport America before the end of 2023. Virgin signed a 20-year lease for its "Gateway to Space" building at the Spaceport in 2008 and employs close to 300 people in New Mexico, said Scott McLaughlin, Spaceport America's executive director.
Virgin Galactic's stock price (NYSE: SPCE) sat at $3.38 at the time of publishing after opening Wednesday at $3.50.
This story has been updated to correct the spelling of Anastasia Mayers' last name.
