Virgin Galactic launched the first tourist flight into space – Kommersant

Virgin Galactic has launched its first tourist-carrying vehicle to the edge of space, more than 80km above sea level, AFP reports. The passengers of the first tourist flight into space were 80-year-old Briton John Goodwin, a participant in the 1972 Olympic Games in canoeing competitions, as well as natives of Antigua and Barbuda – 40-year-old Keisha Shahaff and her daughter, 18-year-old Anastacia Myers.

The flight, dubbed Galactic 02, was the second commercial flight organized by the company. The passengers of the first paid flight were a group of Italian military researchers, the flight was financed by the Italian Air Force. Carried out today, August 10, the flight was the first flight with tourists, not scientists.

Ms. Shahaff, who works as a fitness trainer, won a ticket to fly into space in a raffle organized by the non-profit organization Space for Humanity. The company aims to expand people’s access to space. Ms Myers is studying philosophy and physics at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland.

Mr. Goodwin became the first civilian to buy a ticket for a commercial flight into space. In 2014, he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease. He became the second person with this disease to travel into space. The first was American astronaut Richard Clifford.

Flights into space Virgin Galactic carries out on a twin-body carrier aircraft, which raises the spacecraft with passengers to the required height, and then unhooks it. The rocket-powered ship then approaches the US Air Force’s edge of space, more than 50 miles above sea level. At this level, passengers can already feel weightless. At the same time, in accordance with the definition of the International Aviation Federation, the official boundary of space and the Earth’s atmosphere is the Karman line, which is located at an altitude of 100 km above sea level.

The first company to organize flights to the edge of space was Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin. The company’s rockets sent a total of 31 passengers to an altitude of more than 100 km. Commercial flights have been suspended after an accident during the launch of an unmanned capsule with equipment, which occurred in September 2022.

Erdni Kagaltynov