Virgin Galactic: nearly 8000 candidates for a space flight

Virgin Galactic, which plans to send its first customers to space by summer 2020, has more than doubled its reservations since the end of September and now has 7,957 people on its waiting list.

The company of billionaire Richard Branson has just launched a new reservation operation called "One small step". Referring to the famous formula of Neil Armstrong on the Moon fifty years ago, Virgin Galactic wants to offer the possibility, for individuals wishing to travel soon on his ship in space, to reserve their place for a first payment of 1 000 dollars.

You can now take One Small Step towards reserving your seat on a @VirginGalactic flight to space. Register here https://t.co/8JrY98FbR4 pic.twitter.com/apK5EIG5IB

The total ticket price for flirting for several minutes with the stars has not been specified. Virgin Galactic had closed its flights for sale at the end of 2018 after its first test and after having already received orders from around 600 individuals for total deposits of $ 80 million.

A few days ago, the SpaceShipTwo, VSS Unity, intended for suborbital tourist flights, landed in New Mexico, where the new base dedicated to commercial activities is located. The infrastructure, dubbed Spaceport America, is described as the world's first commercial spaceport. It was inaugurated in August 2019.

The relocation of VSS Unity to Spaceport America should allow the start of the final stages of Virgin Galactic's flight test program. These will begin with journeys stowed on the carrier aircraft which should allow ground crews to "familiarize themselves with airspace and ground control".

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VSM Eve and SpaceShipTwo will then make a series of round trips between New Mexico and California, where aircraft engineering and manufacturing are located, to carry out maintenance and modernization of the aircraft.

Watch a behind the scenes clip of SpaceShipTwo's captive carry test flight that saw it relocate to NM. The full vid is on our YouTube page and features an interview with the person responsible for spaceline operations, Virgin Galactic President, Mike Moses https://t.co/OgOgSHqmcu pic.twitter.com/6OrNd62cQF

In February 2019, an experimental flight gave a taste of what space tourists will experience. SpaceShipTwo is designed to take six tourist passengers. The Virgin Galactic spacecraft is dropped aloft by a carrier plane, like a bomb, then it ignites its rocket engine for about a minute to climb straight to the sky and reach space.

At the peak of the trajectory, the passengers float for several minutes in weightlessness. Then the ship descends and hovers to the airstrip.

Reach space, 80 kilometers

Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo, dubbed VSS Unity, has already reached an altitude of 82.7 kilometers. The space border is commonly believed to be 100 km above sea level, but the U.S. military considers it to be a little lower, 50 miles (about 80.4 km) away.

For Virgin Galactic, whose share price has soared in recent months, this operation aims to reassure investors. The company, which is building a second vessel, posted revenue of $ 529,000 in the last quarter of 2019, but with a net loss of $ 73 million.