English billionaire, Richard Branson, has completed a test flight into space.
With just a little over a week for Amazon’s Jeff Bezos to blast his way into the stars, Branson has beaten him in a plane, developed by his own company, Virgin Galactic.
The flight was conducted onsite at Virgin Galactic’s American spaceport in New Mexico.
Launching at 8:30 am local time, the “winged rocket ship”, dubbed ‘Unity’, took Branson and five other passengers (Branson’s employees “Beth Moses, Colin Bennett and Sirisha Bandla and pilots Dave Mackay and Michael Masucci”) 13 kilometres above ground level.
The plane then detached itself from its mothership to reach the flight’s apex of 88 kilometres.
According to US scientists: “the boundary of space is defined as above 80 kilometres in altitude”.
As such, those on board are said to have “experienced a few minutes of near-zero gravity” before descending back to Earth. The time Branson took off to the time he landed took “about an hour”.
Apparently one of Richard Branson’s solutions to climate change is to add jet propulsion emissions *directly* into the atmosphere.
Got it 🙃
— Jake Lobin (@JakeLobin) July 11, 2021
Using the ship’s cameras to record a video, Branson had words of encouragement for tomorrow’s future dreamers and space explorers.
“To all you kids out there — I was once a child with a dream, looking up to the stars. Now I’m an adult in a spaceship… If we can do this, just imagine what you can do,” Branson said.
After a successful landing (officially marking the company’s fourth test flight), friends and family of the billionaire congratulated him and his company on their achievement.
An executive at Virgin Galactic, Mike Moses, had this to say regarding the matter: “That was an amazing accomplishment … I’m just so delighted at what this open door is going to lead to now. It’s a great moment.”
Fellow billionaires and space rivals, Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, were quick to congratulate Branson. “Congratulations, beautiful flight!” Musk tweeted. “@richardbranson and crew, congratulations on the flight. Can’t wait to join the club!” Bezos said in an Instagram post with a picture of the Unity on a runway.
Jeff Bezos watches Richard Branson reach outer space. pic.twitter.com/tG9e7QtdHa
— Dana Gould (@danagould) July 11, 2021
While the flight marks a milestone in the billionaire’s professional life, it also helps bring awareness to an initiative the English businessman is working on.
It was recently announced that Branson would be collaborating with the non-profit charity, Omaze.
The latter is a supporter of the “Space For Humanity” movement, which aims to make space exploration more accessible by democratising space, “[thereby making it easier to] send citizen astronauts of diverse racial, economic, and disciplinary backgrounds to space”.
“Every charitable donation goes to support Space For Humanity and you’ll be entered into the Omaze sweepstake for the chance to win two seats aboard one of the first commercial Virgin Galactic spaceflights, and a guided tour of Spaceport America given by yours truly,” Branson explained of the partnership.
“Imagine a world where people of all ages and backgrounds, from anywhere, of any gender, of any ethnicity have equal access to space.”
