Well, it may be a few years later than science fiction movies in the fifties and sixties may have thought, but it is finally here. The Earth’s very first commercial spaceport. Not quite Star Wars’ Mos Eisley, the Virgin Galactic spaceport built in the New Mexico desert looks as slick and photoshopped as the latest Star Wars prequels.
Getting into the weightless swing of things, Sir Richard Branson cracked some champagne while swinging from the roof to dedicate his new spaceport – somehow appropriately he was also barefoot.
Branson announced that the next flight into space from American soil will be a Virgin Galactic spaceship, almost a guarantee with the last flight of the US shuttle Atlantis touching down in July ending the USA’s thirty-year shuttle programme.
Virgin Galactic is aimed at making space – the final frontier and exclusive preserve of the super intelligent astronaut, super rich businessman or super unlucky chimpanzee – accessible to the (almost) average person. In comparison with the sixty million pounds or so charged by the Russians, Virgin Galactic will cost $200 000 for a two-and-a-half hour flight that includes five minutes in space. In the crowd there to witness the dedication ceremony were 150 people who had already bought tickets to go into space and one who already had been there – Buzz Aldrin. They were all treated to an overflight by the WhiteKnight Two, one of the two motherships that will shuttle one of the five smaller spaceships to high altitude where they will be released to jet off into space with their high-priced passengers.
Branson sees space becoming viable commercially within ten years, with hotels, cheaper orbital flights and much faster intercontinental flights – such as London to Australia in two-and-a-half hours. He sees intercontinental flights as ‘…just popping out of the earth’s atmosphere and down into Sydney.’
Commercial flights were originally planned to begin in 2007 but met delays. Now test flights will begin next year and it is hoped that commercial flights will begin soon afterward.
For more on this story visit the BBC website or go to Virgin Galactic if you would like to book a seat (lucky you!).
