Tourism Spaceplane Approaching Blast-Off

by Hana Levi Julian

(IsraelNN.com) Private tourism will take a leap into space, with "the final frontier" to be revealed in the unveiling next month of the SpaceShip2 spacecraft on December 7.

The festive "blast-off" in the Mojave Desert in California will be kicked off by Richard Branson, chairman of Virgin Galactic, who will show off the first private aircraft in history designed to carry tourists into space.

Branson, who promised in July 2009 at the Oshkosh Air Show that the spaceplane would be unveiled in December, said test flights will begin following the festive event.

The Virgin Galactic spaceline has plans on the table to operate a fleet of five such craft, and the first paying customers are expected to fly by 2011. Initial flights are intended to launch from Spaceport America, New Mexico, according to the company.

The innovative technology involved in the project is expected to create an especially wide opening for publicity of the spacecraft due to the unique aerodynamic design of the aircraft, which is unlike anything ever before created. Officials said the ship is the first ever to be composed entirely of carbon alloy.

The project is based in part on technology developed for a previous spaceplane model, SpaceShip1, licensed from Mojave Aerospace Ventures and held by Paul Allen. It is considered a suborbital spaceplane, designed specifically for carrying space tourists, and was developed under a joint venture between Scaled Composites and Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Group.

SpaceShip2 will be able to carry six passengers and two pilots, and will reach 4,200 kilometers per hour (2,600 miles per hour), using a single hybrid rocket motor. It will launch at 15,200 meters (50,000 feet) from its mother ship, WhiteKnight2, and will use a feathered re-entry system, feasible due to the low speed of re-entry. All seats will recline back during landing to decrease the discomfort of G-forces.

Israeli representatives will also have a place of honor at the event -- the Israeli Galatic Dreamlines firm won the bid to sell tickets in Israel for tours in space. The company reports that a ticket will cost a happy tourist $200,000, with a deposit of 50 percent required in advance to reserve the seat.

The spaceship symbolizes the next step towards privatization of space travel for the general public," said Eliran Yaron, CEO of Galatic Dreamlines. Pleasure that until now was limited to astronauts or owners of great fortunes who allowed themselves to pay $20 million, will now be open to more and more people. The first spaceship pilots will enjoy three days of pre-flight preparation and acclimatization to change in the gravitational forces, and then will blast off into the atmosphere at eight times the speed of sound.

Thus far some 300 tickets have been purchased by adventurous tourists around the globe, and the sum total of the deposits paid to fly on the first spaceship tourism flight stands at $40 million.