Virgin Galactic's suborbital space plane is ready to prove itself.
The company is set to conduct the first fully commercial flight of its SpaceShipTwo space plane, VSS Unity, along with proving its research capabilities that could help experts learn more about medicine, astronomy, and physics.
People interested in watching the launch can do so online.
VirginGalactic SpaceShipTwo First Commercial Launch
Virgin Galactic's SpaceshipTwo takes off for a suborbital test flight of the VSS Unity on December 13, 2018, in Mojave, California.
Virgin Galactic had made its final preparations for its SpaceShipTwo's first commercial launch, which will lift off on June 29 at around 11 AM EDT, according to Space.com.
The company is planning to launch its VMS Eve mothership aircraft under the mission Galactic 1 with the VSS Unity space plane attached from Spaceport America in New Mexico. The company expects that Unity will separate from the mothership nearly an hour later, per Space News.
It would then ignite its hybrid rocket motor for suborbital flight and land back at the spaceport.
Unity will be carrying four passengers, namely: Walter Villadei and Angelo Landolfi of the Italian Air Force, Pantaleone Carlucci, Italy's National Research Council, and Colin Bennett, a Virgin Galactic astronaut instructor. Bennett, who will assess the research flight experience during this flight, was on Unity's July 2021 flight - the same one that carried company founder Richard Branson.
Virgin Galctic's first commercial SpaceShipTwo launch also serves as a research mission - it will carry out 13 experiments for collecting biomedical and cosmic radiation data and studying fluid dynamics in microgravity. Villandei and Landolfi plan to conduct these experiments during the flight, with Bennett helping them in the background.
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Sirisha Bandla, vice president of government affairs and research operations at Virgin Galactic, mentioned that SpaceShipTwo's first commercial launch being a research mission is perfect because it showcases that Unity is another lab environment producing science and technologies the company can invest into the people back on Earth. Simply put, Virgin Galactic wants to demonstrate the space plane's microgravity research capabilities, which serve as another source of potential revenue alongside private tourist spaceflight services.
Interestingly, Virgin Galactic CEO Michael Colglazier mentioned in a statement that the SpaceShipTwo's launch would usher in " a new era of repeatable and reliable access to space for government and research institutions for years to come."
Weirdly enough, some people likened SpaceShipTwo's first commercial launch to the doomed OceanGate Titan sub, with some people on social media raising concerns over the mission, per the New York Post.
Virgin Galactic has yet to respond to these concerns.
How To Watch Virgin Galactic Launching SpaceShipTwo
People interested in watching Virgin Galactic launching SpaceShipTwo on June 29 can do so at Space.com, courtesy of the company. It will also live stream the launch for free online on its official website and YouTube through its official channel on the video-sharing platform.
Unlike NASA, the company doesn't seem interested in broadcasting pre-launch events, meaning that viewers will only get to the space plane launch from the space station and the immediate events after it.
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