Commercial Operation
The duration of the flights will be approximately 2.5 hours, though only a few minutes of that will be in space. The price will initially be $200,000. More than 65,000 would-be space tourists applied for the first batch of 100 tickets. In December 2007 Virgin Galactic had 200 paid-up customers on its books for the early flights, and 95% were passing the 6-8 g centrifuge tests. By the start of 2011, that number had increased to over 400 paid customers, and to 575 by early 2013.
Following the first successful powered flight of SpaceShipTwo in April 2013, Virgin Galactic announced that the price for a seat would increase 25 percent to $250,000, before the middle of May 2013, and would remain at $250,000 "until the first 1,000 people have traveled, so that it matches up with inflation since started."
Following 50–100 test flights, the first paying customers are expected to fly aboard the craft in 2014. Refining the projected schedule in late 2009, Virgin Galactic declined to announce a firm timetable for commercial flights, but did reiterate that initial flights would take place from Spaceport America. Operational roll-out will be based on a "safety-driven schedule". In addition to making suborbital passenger launches, Virgin Galactic will market SpaceShipTwo for suborbital space science missions.
Read more about this topic: Space Ship Two
Famous quotes containing the words commercial and/or operation:
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—Francis Bacon (1560–1626)