By akademiotoelektronik, 07/05/2022

Another billionaire just beat out Jeff Bezos in the space travel race

ME FIRSTAfter the astral travel announcements made by Jeff Bezos, who should take off on July 20, another famous billionaire could well beat him to the post.

By Felix Guillaume

Richard Branson, founder of the famous Virgin group in 1970, doubled the father of Amazon Jeff Bezos on the home stretch in the race for space tourism, if it exists as there was a race for the conquest of space in the middle of the last century. The British billionaire announced that he would leave aboard the VSS Unity, creation of Virgin Galactic, the aeronautical antenna of the conglomerate. The take-off being scheduled for July 11, it should thus be nine days ahead of its American counterpart and join the very closed circle of space tourists, eight in number for the moment.

The Virgin bonus, compared to Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin flight, is that the trip will be transcribed live on the Internet. In this same perspective of sharing, Richard Branson promised that his company “will use his observations on his training and his flight experience to improve the trip for all future astronaut customers”, he who “will follow the same training, preparation and flight as future Virgin Galactic astronauts”. In addition to the billionaire, three other people will be invited to contemplate the Earth from above.

A carrier aircraft operated by two pilots, unlike conventional rockets, will take off from a runway and once at high altitude will drop the spacecraft that will be attached to it. Once free, the shuttle will propel itself into orbit with its engines and return to solid ground by hovering. “After sixteen years of research, engineering, and testing, Virgin Galactic stands at the forefront of a new commercial space industry that will open space to humanity,” said Richard Branson in a press release, before concluding that “space belongs to us all”. Virgin Galactic has already scheduled the start of its scheduled commercial flights for 2022.