Virgin Galactic Spaceship Breaks Mach 2, Reaches Mesosphere for the First Time

The test saw the craft reach a height of 170,800 feet at apogee, meaning in effect that the machine entered for the first time a region of the Earth’s atmosphere known as Mesosphere. During the 42 seconds of rocket burn, VSS Unity reached 2.47 times the speed of sound.

“It was a thrill from start to finish. Unity’s rocket motor performed magnificently again, and Sooch pulled off a smooth landing,” said in a statement pilot Dave Mackay.

“This was a new altitude record for both of us in the cockpit, not to mention our mannequin in the back, and the views of Earth from the black sky were magnificent.”

VSS Unity is the second ship built by Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic as a means to make some money from the emerging space tourism industry. The first one, called VSS Enterprise, crashed in 2014 following a catastrophic in-flight breakup that killed the vehicle’s pilot.

Part of the SpaceShipTwo class of ships invented by Branson, Unity launches horizontally at 50,000 feet (15 km) from the underbelly of the VMS Eve carrier. This maneuver allows the ship to bypass the denser regions of the atmosphere and save fuel and money.

The ship has a capacity of six passengers and two crew and comes as a bullet-shaped cylinder measuring 60 feet in length (18 meters).

Earlier in the year, Branson told various media outlets he expects to be taking the first ride to space himself in the following months. For tourists, the price of a very short trip to the edge of space is $200,000.

The steep price includes pre-flight medical checks and 3 days of pre-flight preparation.