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posted by martyb on Sunday August 18 2019, @10:21PM   Printer-friendly
from the Where-is-the-line-for-TSA? dept.

Virgin Galactic unveils luxury lounge at its airport for space tourism

Richard Branson's space tourism startup, Virgin Galactic, is showing off a luxurious lounge area and top-shelf amenities for its wealthy clientele. The company on Thursday shared images of the interior at Spaceport America in New Mexico. Ticket holders, most of whom paid $200,000 or more for a Virgin Galactic flight, will one day congregate at the spaceport before they board a supersonic plane for a 90-minute ride into the upper atmosphere.

The renovations are another sign that Virgin Galactic is preparing to open for business at Spaceport America, a controversial facility that was built a decade ago using local taxpayer dollars. Images of the first-floor lounge area show a large coffee bar made of "back-lit Italian marble hovering above hand-crafted oak," according to a press release. Modern couches line the floor-to-ceiling windows at the spaceport with panoramic views of the surrounding desert. Other new facilities include a mission control center, a working area for pilots, and a briefing center.

Hundreds of people are lined up to ride a short high-speed trip aboard a Virgin Galactic space plane. Branson, who founded the venture in 2004, plans to be the first tourist aboard a Virgin Galactic space plane. The company said it has additional test flights planned and will be ready to start flying paying customers in the first half of 2020.

Also at TechCrunch.

Older article: Virgin Galactic prepares to move vehicles, staff to Spaceport America

Related: Virgin Galactic: Rocket Reaches Space Again in Test Flight (Update)


Original Submission

Related Stories

Virgin Galactic: Rocket Reaches Space Again in Test Flight (Update) 7 comments

Submitted via IRC for Bytram

Virgin Galactic: Rocket reaches space again in test flight (Update)

Virgin Galactic's rocket plane reached space for a second time in a test flight over California on Friday, climbing higher and faster than before while also carrying a crewmember to evaluate the long-awaited passenger experience.

The winged spaceship soared at three times the speed of sound to an altitude of 55.8 miles (89.8 kilometers) before gliding to a safe landing at Mojave Air and Space Port in the desert north of Los Angeles, Virgin Galactic said.

In addition to chief pilot David Mackay and co-pilot Mike "Sooch" Masucci, the crew included Virgin Galactic's chief astronaut instructor, Beth Moses.

Moses, described as an expert micro-gravity researcher who is in charge of evaluating the passenger cabin, floated free to test elements of the interior.

Virgin Galactic is working toward commercial operations that will take passengers on supersonic thrill rides to the lower reaches of space to experience a few minutes of weightlessness and a view of the Earth below.

[...] A major goal of Friday's flight was evaluating its handling during descent with its twin tails rotated upward relative to the fuselage.

The "feathered" configuration is used to slow and stabilize the craft as it falls back into the thickening atmosphere. The name came from designer Burt Rutan comparing the mechanism to the feathers of a badminton shuttlecock. The tails rotate back to normal position for the glide to Earth.

Altitude and speed were not specific targets for the flight, Virgin Galactic CEO George Whitesides said in an interview earlier this week.

"If we have sort of a nominal-duration burn we will get up pretty high, but that is not one of the formal test goals for this one," he said.


Original Submission

Richard Branson to Sell 22% Stake in Virgin Galactic 11 comments

Branson to sell part of Virgin Galactic stake

Richard Branson, the founder and largest shareholder of suborbital spaceflight company Virgin Galactic, will sell more than a fifth of Virgin Group's majority stake in the company to raise funds to aid its other companies affected by the pandemic.

In a statement May 11, the company announced that Vieco 10, the Virgin Group holding company that owns the majority of Virgin Galactic, planned to sell up to 25 million shares, accounting for about 22% of its overall stake in the company. That sale would generate $485 million for Virgin at the price of $19.40 per share at the close of trading May 11.

Virgin Group said the sale of stock, the company said in a statement and in its S-1 filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), was "to support its portfolio of global leisure, holiday and travel businesses that have been affected by the unprecedented impact of COVID-19."

Related: Virgin Galactic Shows Off its Spaceport
Virgin Galactic Unveils Commercial Space Suits
Virgin Galactic Begins 'Astronaut Readiness Program' for First Paying Customers
Nevada-Based Bigelow Aerospace Lays Off Entire Workforce
OneWeb Goes Bankrupt, Lays Off Staff, Will Sell Satellite-Broadband Business
Virgin Galactic's Spaceship Flies from its New Home Base for the First Time


Original Submission

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  • (Score: 1, Flamebait) by PartTimeZombie on Sunday August 18 2019, @11:26PM

    by PartTimeZombie (4827) on Sunday August 18 2019, @11:26PM (#881888)

    Virgin Galactic looks more like a tax dodge than a real business.

    They have spent 15 years developing a "space plane" which can't actually go to space, and needed the taxpayers of New Mexico to build the space port they claim they will use, but they have sent exactly 0 people into space.

    Yay socialism?

  • (Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Sunday August 18 2019, @11:28PM (7 children)

    by fustakrakich (6150) on Sunday August 18 2019, @11:28PM (#881889) Journal

    Virgin Galactic sounds a bit ironic, no?

    --
    La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
    • (Score: 4, Funny) by NateMich on Monday August 19 2019, @12:22AM (3 children)

      by NateMich (6662) on Monday August 19 2019, @12:22AM (#881900)

      Virgin Galactic sounds a bit ironic, no?

      You're supposed to start here. When you're more experienced you try your luck with some SpaceX.

      • (Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Monday August 19 2019, @12:26AM

        by fustakrakich (6150) on Monday August 19 2019, @12:26AM (#881901) Journal

        try your luck with some SpaceX

        Can I score some on the darkweb?

        --
        La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
      • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 19 2019, @03:19AM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 19 2019, @03:19AM (#881944)

        The virgin galactic vs. the Chad^W Elon space couch.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 19 2019, @03:24AM (2 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 19 2019, @03:24AM (#881949)

      No, it's named... Glenfield
      It's for the new Virgin Galactic space plane fleet called... Zero X, Martian Exploration Vehicle (MEV), Air-Sea Rescue Jets, W.N.S Atlantic, Fireflash, Air-Sea Rescue Helicopters, The Hood's Helicopter, and of course Thunderbirds 1-5

      • (Score: 2) by driverless on Monday August 19 2019, @04:33AM (1 child)

        by driverless (4770) on Monday August 19 2019, @04:33AM (#881976)

        No, it's named... Glenfield

        Glenfield [wikipedia.org]? Don't think they had a spaceport there. Admittedly it was where Rachel Hunter came from, and she's pretty spaced out...

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 19 2019, @05:12PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 19 2019, @05:12PM (#882217)

          It went way over your head...
          Thunderbirds are go!
          https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3138604/ [imdb.com]

  • (Score: 2) by black6host on Monday August 19 2019, @12:19AM (3 children)

    by black6host (3827) on Monday August 19 2019, @12:19AM (#881899) Journal

    I suppose that either a) Space travel will only be a luxury that really, really rich people will ever be able to afford or b) when leaving the planet is the only option for the survival of mankind that Space travel will only be a luxury that the really, really rich people will ever be able to afford.

    Sorry, a bit of my cynicism showing through there. We didn't get to the moon or all the other things we've done in the name of exploration other than anything but plain old hard work and dedication. By all involved. It's really hard to get worked up about a "luxurious lounge area and top-shelf amenities "

    On a humorous note I think the last thing we need in space is a bunch of drunk space tourists that couln't handle the top-shelf stuff :) Perhaps I'll write a song about that...

    • (Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 19 2019, @12:29AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 19 2019, @12:29AM (#881903)

      I suppose that either a) Intercontinental travel will only be a luxury that really, really rich people will ever be able to afford or b) when leaving the continent is the only option for survival that Intercontinental travel will only be a luxury that the really, really rich people will ever be able to afford.

      Sorry, a bit of my cynicism showing through there. We didn't get to Africa or all the other places we've been in the name of exploration other than anything but plain old hard work and dedication. By all involved. It's really hard to get worked up about a "luxurious lounge area and top-shelf amenities "

      On a humorous note I think the last thing we need in other continents is a bunch of drunk intercontinental tourists that can't handle the top-shelf stuff :) Perhaps I'll write a song about that...

      It's utterly absurd to consider that a normal person will ever be able to afford to charter a ship, at least without selling themselves into indentured servitude for many years. Sure physics permits far cheaper intercontinental travel, but we'll never be able to actually realize that.

    • (Score: 4, Interesting) by takyon on Monday August 19 2019, @01:12AM (1 child)

      by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Monday August 19 2019, @01:12AM (#881915) Journal

      Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin New Shepard will offer reasonably cheap suborbital space tourism. For some definitions of reasonable.

      It will take massive fully reusable rockets like SpaceX's Starship to really knock $/kg down and get people into orbit or beyond.

      The goal is to get people to Mars at around $100k to $500k per person. Many people would be able to sell their home, pay the ticket price, and have money left over for getting their own Mars home built.

      Now you will definitely have people who regret doing that, because Mars is shit compared to Earth, but out of billions of people, tens of thousands of ordinary (not rich by U.S. standards) people will be both willing and financially able to go.

      Starship ticket prices to the ISS or space hotels in Earth orbit should be considerably cheaper than a Mars trip (which will likely include a free return trip BTW), especially if no in-orbit refueling is needed (no Starship tankers launched along with the rocket you're on).

      Then there's a possibility of using Starship for suborbital, fast intercontinental flights. This might be a tough sell if you factor in the usual TSA nonsense and a need to have the landing zone miles offshore from a major city. 20-30 minute flight sounds great, but you might have 4 hours of junk tacked on.

      --
      [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
      • (Score: 2) by black6host on Monday August 19 2019, @02:28AM

        by black6host (3827) on Monday August 19 2019, @02:28AM (#881927) Journal

        Alright... After reading your post I decided that the cheaper we could make the flights so that we get not just the 1% but perhaps the 10% to fly their asses to Mars.... I can see the wisdom in that :)

  • (Score: 2) by corey on Monday August 19 2019, @02:20AM (3 children)

    by corey (2202) on Monday August 19 2019, @02:20AM (#881925)

    Sounds like how I imagine the first airlines started? It was all exclusive and fancy in the early days.

    One day we might look back on this with a similar feeling.

    • (Score: 2) by black6host on Monday August 19 2019, @02:30AM

      by black6host (3827) on Monday August 19 2019, @02:30AM (#881928) Journal

      Indeed. There is a bit of the get off my lawn thinking in my original post, to be sure. On the other hand if we were to put enough effort, energy, money or whatever into ensuring this planet that we live on remains habitable I think my cynicism may, perhaps, abate.

    • (Score: 2) by FatPhil on Monday August 19 2019, @03:36AM

      by FatPhil (863) <pc-soylentNO@SPAMasdf.fi> on Monday August 19 2019, @03:36AM (#881951) Homepage
      I'll see your "airlines", and raise you "zeppelins". The hydrogen-buoyed variety.

      Oh, the humanity...
      --
      Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 19 2019, @05:41AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 19 2019, @05:41AM (#881997)

      This seems less like the airlines, and more like a very expensive version of the thrill rides that barnstormers gave people in the 1920s.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 19 2019, @02:44AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 19 2019, @02:44AM (#881932)

    Poor states are so desperate to lure business they get taken like rubes for their money.

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