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Virgin Orbit’s space dreams might have not taken off (it filed for bankruptcy in April), but Virgin Galactic is hoping to go where no Richard Branson-funded company has gone before.
The space tourism company launched its first commercial mission to the cusp of space in June, with a six-person crew that conducted experiments while on board, meaning the spaceflight was centered on research, rather than tourism for the 1%.
The flight was a test run for the company. Virgin Galactic plans to fly a second mission in August, followed by monthly passenger flights.
Virgin Galactic spent more than a decade to achieve commercial spaceflight and suffered setbacks along the way, including a fatal crash in 2014.
During a test flight carrying CEO Richard Branson in 2021, it traveled 86 kilometers (53 miles) into the sky, beyond the US-recognized boundary of space, but just shy of the 100-km boundary known as the Kármán Line.
Even though the June mission was a success, it’ll be awhile before you can snag a seat. The line to get onto one of Galactic’s tours is pretty long: The company has a backlog of about 800 passengers, and ticket prices run around $450,000.
While Virgin Galactic celebrates its entry into commercial spaceflight, it still has a long way to go before it catches up to competitors like SpaceX and Blue Origin. Blue Origin completed its first commercial flight in 2021, when it sent Jeff Bezos and three others into suborbital flight. Blue Origin has completed 22 missions and has sent celebrities like William Shatner of Star Trek fame into orbit.
Meanwhile, SpaceX has completed a few flights to orbit in partnership with companies like Axiom Space and government organizations like NASA, offering tours of the International Space Station.
SpaceX eventually plans to send a tourist on a trip around the moon on its second Starship rocket. (The first Starship exploded shortly after takeoff in April.) The Starship is also slated to fly eight participants around the moon in the so-called Dear Moon mission.