Branson/Rutan Spacecraft Makes Public Debut

Mark Phelps

Sunday, December 13, 2009 at 01:43 AM ET

Verified

Key Takeaways:

SpaceShipTwo, developed by Burt Rutan and Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic, debuted as the successor to the Ansari X-Prize winning SpaceShipOne.
Virgin Galactic plans to launch commercial space tourism as early as 2011, aiming to send thousands into space with 2.5-hour flights offering five minutes of zero-gravity.
Each SpaceShipTwo flight will carry six passengers and two pilots at a ticket price of $200,000, with around 300 tickets already sold for the program.
Branson intends to build a fleet of five commercial spacecraft for over $400 million to expand access to space travel.

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SpaceShipTwo, designed by Burt Rutan and bankrolled by Sir Richard Branson, made its first public appearance last week. Rutan’s prototype SpaceShipOne won the $10 million Ansari X-Prize in 2004 as the first privately operated aircraft to reach space, then repeat the feat within two weeks.

Branson and Rutan hope to launch their commercial space tourism program as early as 2011, with Branson (and his family) joining Rutan on the passenger manifest for the first flight. Their joint enterprise, Virgin Galactic, was founded by Branson who said, “We want this program to be a whole new beginning in a commercial era of space travel.”