Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic has successfully completed its first commercial space flight – with paying customers on board.
The flight – Galactic 01 – took off on board a carrier plane from New Mexico before separating and launching into space – 50 miles from the Earth, which is classed by NASA as the border of space.
Mr Branson flew in a test flight two years ago, but the company had encountered setbacks since.
This flight is now being seen as a significant stepping stone towards commercial space tourism becoming a normal – albeit expensive (with prices ranging from $200,000 to $450,000) – part of the global travel and tourism industry.
Virgin Galactic’s next flight – dubbed Galactic 02 – is scheduled for August, after which the company hopes to operate monthly space journeys.
Former Amazon boss Jeff Bezos has skin in the game, through his Blue Origin enterprise; as does uber entrepreneur Tesla and Twitter boss Elon Musk, via his SpaceX company.
