spacetoday.net: Virgin Galactic flies researchers and tourist on fifth commercial mission

Virgin Galactic flies researchers and tourist on fifth commercial mission

Posted: Sun, Nov 5, 2023, 12:02 PM ET (1702 GMT)
Galactic 05 SpaceShipTwo flight, Nov 2023 (Virgin Galactic)

Virgin Galactic flew two researchers and a space tourist on its latest suborbital spaceflight Thursday. The Galactic 05 mission by its VSS Unity spaceplane took off from Spaceport America in New Mexico at 11:00 am EDT (1500 GMT), landing nearly an hour later after reaching a peak altitude of about 87.2 kilometers. On board were researchers Kellie Gerardi and Alan Stern, who conducted several experiments to demonstrate the ability to carry out research on commercial suborbital vehicles. The third customer was a space tourist, Ketty Pucci-Sisti Maisonrouge. The flight was the sixth for Unity in less than six months, and is the final one this year as the vehicle goes into an annual maintenance period before resuming flights in January.