Virgin Galactic details its space travel plans

Safety in the front seat
It would be wrong to think of SpaceShipTwo as a “scaled-up” SpaceShipOne. And while both the suborbital rocket plane and the White Knight carrier mothership are both larger in size, extra margin must be built in for safety systems. Redundant and backup systems are to be employed too.

Lofting six passengers and two pilots up to the edge of space means putting safety in the front seat and a rigorous testing and shakeout program of hardware is envisioned, Tai said.

“From a business perspective,” Tai suggested, “I would very much like him to spend the least amount of money and do it in the shortest period of time. But that’s not the fundamental requirement. It’s producing the safest, best-performing ship. If I have to wait an extra year for that, I’ll take the pressure from everyone…to make sure that we get the best possible product.”

Dreamy job
Tai said by the time the first systems are delivered to Virgin Galactic, something in the range of $150 million will have been spent.

Then an operational structure must be put in place. Facilities are required to handle early operations in Mojave, California and at Spaceport America in New Mexico. A team of exceptionally competent and skilled personnel to operate the spaceliners are also needed.

“And that’s going to cost money as well. I believe we’ll spend between $225 million and $250 million” to reach that operating point, Tai said, perhaps staring in 2009 but also depending on how the testing program goes.

There will be a Virgin Galactic cadre of spaceliner pilots. They are being drawn from Virgin’s network of airlines. “We pay top dollar. And that attracts some of the best pilots,” Tai said, with those selected for space travel duty picked after a meticulous training and preparation course.

“We’ll ensure that we get the best possible pilots. It’ll be a dreamy job,” Tai emphasized.

Passionate passengers
Tai speculates that hundreds of spaceships might be needed to handle passionate passengers from around the world that hunger for space travel.

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Beyond the New Mexico spaceport — once the case for safety and turnaround time is made with the SpaceShipTwo system — perhaps semi-permanent facilities, even local municipal airports, could handle space travel operations, Tai suggested.

“It’s clearly a goal of Virgin Galactic of being a spaceline operator, not just for same-point-to-same-point space tourism,” Tai said. “We want to go point-to-point on the planet …with exceptional style and safety.”

Getting cheap access to low Earth orbit, Tai continued, will be leveraged from the ability to globally hop about. “That’s where the real market is. It will be done off the back of point-to-point … not off going straight to low-Earth orbit.”

With that technology in hand, it’s onward to orbital destinations, space hotel stopovers, and to the moon and beyond, Tai said. “That’s the big step, to break free of the surly bonds of Earth.”

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