This is the moment the crew aboard Virgin Galactic’s spaceplane celebrated with a fist bump during the company’s first commercial mission.
Italian researcher Walter Villadei and the company’s astronaut instructor Colin Bennett shared a celebratory moment in the spaceplane as it exited Earth’s atmosphere and flew to the edge of space.
Founded by Richard Branson in 2004, the $1.31 billion Virgin Galactic has spent nearly a decade preparing for the mission, followed by several years of development setbacks.
The “mother ship,” a carrier aircraft named VMS Eve, and a spaceplane lifted off at 10:45 a.m. ET from Virgin Galactic’s Spaceport America in New Mexico.
The SpaceShipTwo VSS Unity rocket plane reached a speed of Mach 3 within seconds of being unleashed by Eve at 11:30 a.m. ET and shot to the edge of space.
Unity shut itself down as soon as it reached space, allowing the men to enjoy a few minutes of zero gravity and epic views of the final frontier.
The crew also held an Italian flag as it floated in the cabin.
Virgin Galactic launched its first commercial flight on Thursday. The crew celebrated their trip into space with a fist bump
A crew of Italian explorers celebrated a successful launch aboard Virgin Galactic’s first commercial flight, which took them more than 50 miles above the surface
The mission, named Galactic 01, landed back on the New Mexico airstrip at 11:50 am.
Also aboard the epic voyage were Pantaleone Carlucci and Lieutenant Colonel Angelo Landolfi.
Unlike Branson’s rivals Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, this flight’s crew was not manned by wealthy individuals or celebrities who spend hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars on the experience.
The focus of the Galactic 01 mission was to test 13 experiments in microgravity, collecting biometric data, measuring cognitive performance and recording how certain liquids and solids mix under microgravity conditions.
And the three Italian researchers did not pay for their places.
Future tickets were originally priced at $250,000 each, but Virgin Galactic recently increased that price to $450,000.
Musk’s SpaceX and Bezos’ Blue Origin also use rockets to launch capsules into space, while Branson took a different approach with airborne launches.
Once Virgin Galactic’s planes reach an altitude of approximately 45,000 feet, the mothership will release the spaceplane, which will then launch to the final frontier.
The technique has been explored in flight research for several decades, including the X-1, the first aircraft to break the sound barrier, and the X-15, the fastest manned aircraft ever flown with a top speed of 4,520 miles per mile Hour reached flight 1967.
And it reduces the need for vast amounts of fuel because the spacecraft doesn’t use the rocket’s power to crawl through the dense lower atmosphere.
Cheers erupted on the runway as the larger carrier, dubbed VMS Eve, rocketed down the runway and lifted off the ground with SpaceShipTwo VSS Unity strapped securely to the underside
The SpaceShipTwo VSS Unity rocket plane reached a speed of Mach 3 within seconds of being unleashed by Eve at 11:30 a.m. ET and shot to the edge of space
Virgin Galactic’s spaceplane was powered by two pilots while the four passengers sat in the cabin and prepared for space.
For Italian Air Force Colonel Walter Villadei, appointed commander, flying aboard the spaceplane was part of his astronaut training for a future mission to the International Space Station.
He was joined Thursday by two Italian colleagues: Air Force Lt. Col. Angelo Landolfi, a doctor and flight surgeon, and Pantaleone Carlucci, a research council member who serves as a flight engineer and payload specialist.
Rounding out the crew were their Virgin Galactic trainer, Colin Bennett, the company’s lead ‘astronaut instructor’, and Unity’s two pilots, Michael Masucci and Nicola Pecile.
At the climax of the flight, the crew experienced a few minutes of weightlessness
Cameras surrounding Unity captured it hanging with the blackness of space in the background
One of the Italian researchers wore a special suit that measures biometrics and physiological responses, while another performed tests using sensors to track heart rate, brain function and other readings in microgravity.
And the third studied how certain liquids and solids mix in this very weak gravity.
The gleaming white spaceplane is designed to separate from its twin-fuselage mothership and then fall away while the pilots fire the craft’s engine to send the rocket plane in a near-vertical climb at about three times the speed of sound into the blackness of space.
At the climax of the flight, the crew experienced a few minutes of zero gravity with the engine off before the spacecraft entered reentry mode and glided to the runway back to the spaceport.
The flight took about 90 minutes from takeoff to landing.