The status of space travel
Space tourism recently took a big step toward becoming an everyday reality, said Kenneth Chang in The New York Times. On April 29, a Virgin Galactic spaceship with room for six passengers made its first powered flight before landing safely about 10 minutes later. The successful California test emboldened Virgin founder Richard Branson to predict that his space division will be carrying tourists by early 2014, if not sooner. For its April flight, SpaceShipTwo was launched by a carrier aircraft before it fired its own engine and reached an altitude of about 10.5 miles. It’ll be pushed to fly higher and faster in future tests before the first passengers, including Branson and his children, step on. While Virgin Galactic isn’t the only private company seeking to put tourists in space, it looks likely to become the first to make the journeys routine. Currently, 560 brave people hold SpaceShipTwo tickets, which cost $200,000 a pop.
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