Did you miss Richard Branson’s first trip to the edge of space? Watch it here

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Richard Branson arrives at Spaceport America in New Mexico on Sunday hours before traveling to the edge of space aboard the Virgin Galactic spacecraft.

Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Images

British billionaire Richard Branson completed his last, and arguably his greatest, adventure on Sunday with a short trip to the edge of space aboard his Virgin Galactic spaceplane. Not only does the flight mark Branson’s first trip into space, it’s the first time Virgin has flown a full crew cabin.

Hundreds of invited guests and members of the media (myself included) watched from the desert floor below at Spaceport America in New Mexico as a third white plume emanating from a SpaceShipTwo Unity rocket crafted by a VMS Eve carrier aircraft suddenly clouded across the sky. engine. The pair took off together at about 8:40 a.m. GMT (7:40 a.m. PT) and 45 minutes later the unit separated from Eve and fired its engine for just under a minute to reach speeds of over Mach 3.

PLAY NOW: Watch this: I watched Branson’s space flight from the runway

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Viewed from the surface, a diffuse but distinct white line can be seen quickly drawing almost perfectly vertically, literally pointing to the sky.

Virgin Galactic spaceship – Two unit spaceplanes and mother ship separated as they fly over the US spaceport, near Fact and Results, New Mexico on Sunday.

Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Emais

Branson called it the “experience of a lifetime” in a steady radio broadcast from the unit as it began to slide back to the ground. The craft then returned to a perfect landing near the same spot where VMS Eve took off about an hour earlier. “Welcome to the dawn of the new space age,” 70-year-old Branson said later from the runway in Spaceport America.

VMS Eve is named after Branson’s mother, Eve, who died of complications from COVID-19 in January.

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“She maintained one last victory, managed to fight off the virus, but put all her energy into the process,” Branson wrote in a blog post he cited as a major inspiration and force behind his career. “She took glider lessons disguised as a boy, and was drafted into the WRENS (Women’s Royal Naval Service) during World War II…she was creative, fearless, and relentless—an entrepreneur before word came.”

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The unit placed it at an estimated elevation of about 53 miles (86 kilometers) above the Earth’s surface. Some would argue that this is less than the generally accepted definition of space, which starts at a nice distance, up to 100 kilometers (62 miles). However, the U.S. Army and NASA set the dividing line at 50 miles (80 kilometers), so it’s clear the whole thing is subjective. And for space tourism purposes, you can experience weightlessness and look down on our home planet against the black void from any height.

Before take off, Branson said he would “look back at our beautiful land and absorb everything and realize that only 500 other people [actually it’s 570, as of Saturday] I did this “.

Also on board was Virgin’s chief astronaut Beth Moses, the only person to have previously ridden in the passenger cabin of SpaceShipTwo, in 2019. The company’s chief operations engineer Colin Bennett was on board with Sirisha Bandla, vice president for government affairs. Bandla handled a research experiment from the University of Florida that involved adapting plant biology to microgravity.

Richard Branson and Virgin Galactic: Watch the space dream come true See all the photos

“VG flights provide, for the first time, the ability to actively monitor experiments during launch and initial entry into space. This ability to study biology that tests launch and then microgravity, perhaps surprisingly, is a radical new development.” The trial’s principal investigator and professor of horticultural sciences said in a statement. “Previously all experiments had to wait until the spaceship was in orbit before the experiment could be monitored.”

Two Virgin Galactic pilots at Unity controls are Dave Mackay and Michael Masucci, with former NASA astronaut CJ Sturckow and former NASA research pilot Kelly Latimer flying VMS Eve.

Richard Branson has announced that Virgin Galactic will be giving up two seats on an upcoming flight.

Omaze

Branson has always been an adventurer and a thrill seeker. His many adventurous exploits include long-distance hot air ballooning and transatlantic sailing voyages. He is the largest person to surf the English Channel by kite.

Once back on solid ground, Branson announced that Virgin will give up two seats on an upcoming flight through the Omaze competition which also encourages donations to the nonprofit Space for Humanity, which says its goal is to “democratize space and develop solutions to the world’s problems by Increase human consciousness.

You can re-watch the Virgin Galactic flight live stream below.

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