Virgin Galactic unveils White Knight Two

by Grant Martin on

Virgin Galactic unveiled the White Knight Two, their delivery vehicle for SpaceShipTwo at their Mojave construction facility today, to glorious fanfare and celebration.
White Knight Two is the second version of the mothership that will deliver the suborbital commercial space vehicle, SpaceShipTwo up to 40,000 feet before the daughtership cruises up into low orbit.

Virgin’s rollout of the ship is the first step in testing the new second phase of their commercial space flight system — a variety of static and flight tests still need to be done before the second duo are ready for real test flights. Indeed, SpaceShipTwo is still under construction and was hidden under a black sheet during the ceremonies today.

Check out the exclusive gallery of Gadling’s visit to the White Knight Two including visits from Sir Richard Branson, Buzz Aldrin and Richard Branson and stay tuned for a Gadling report on the entire event later this week!

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Flight attendant wins trip into space — on Rocketplane!

by Grant Martin on

I thought that Rocketplane was a show on the cartoon network until I read an article this morning reporting that a French Flight Attendant won a trip into sub-orbit with the galactic airline.

First, about the flight attendant: Mathilde Epron was working her daily flight schedule when she grabbed a quick Kit Kat snack, tossed the wrapper in the garbage and went on about her normal duties. Suddenly, struck with a feeling that she should have checked the wrapper, she went back to the trash two hours later, dug out the refuse lo and behold, won one of the first trips into space on fledgling space tourism company, Rocketplane.

Secondly, Virgin Galactic has competition? Where did Rocketplane come from? Tell us more about yourselves and your crazy moniker, Rocketplane, we’re delightfully curious.

Apparently, Ms. Epron is scheduled to get four days of astronaut training at Rocketplanes headquarters in Oklahoma then will be on one of the first flights scheduled in 2010.

Only a shade behind Virgin Galactic, which plans to unveil its White Knight Two later this month and carry passengers in 2009.

If Rocketplace sticks to its guns and testing goes well, we could have an interesting commercial space competition in the next ten years. Maybe all of this competition will drive the price of a flight down from 200-250k down to 100k. Time to start saving!

Other tales from the skies
Amazing and insane stories from a real-life flight attendant and co-pilot

Virgin Atlantic’s “big” announcement

by Jeremy Kressmann on

As Grant mentioned last week, Virgin Atlantic has been up to something. When they started sending all kinds of cryptic emails to their frequent fliers last week, our minds started to run wild. What could it be? In flight jacuzzis for upper class fliers?! New solid gold airplanes?! Personal in-seat LASERS?!

Last night, Gadling headed over to the Frank Gehry-designed IAC Building in Manhattan to find out. After all the suspense, it turns it was for the launch of a new Virgin credit card. Meh. If you’re looking to throw down enough money to wrack up one million miles you can redeem them for a trip on Virgin’s new space flights, Virgin Galactic. Think you can spend enough? Yeah, me neither.

While the announcement wasn’t as momentous as we had hoped, Virgin did manage to throw down a pretty swanky launch party, complete with free massages courtesy of Virgin’s spa partner Cowshed. You wouldn’t have to twist my arm to fly Virgin, the service is awesome. But only if somebody else was paying for my ticket – they are downright expensive. Hey Virgin, how about a ticket giveaway so we can let Gadling readers try for themselves?

Virgin Atlantic and their crafty marketing schemes

by Grant Martin on

Fine, Virgin Atlantic. We’ll bite. But we’re not happy about it. We’ve been digesting small buzzletts about your shenanigans coming up next week on June 12, but we’ve been holding off because it always gives us the willys when we propagate shameless marketing tactics.

It all started with some emails you sent to your loyal flying club members, saying “Have we got something for you, Juliana! It’s brand new. It’s coming soon. And it’s extraordinarily unordinary“, but only promising to reveal the goods on June 12. We also hear that you put up fliers in the office and spread the buzz around your flight crew as well — and now we’re all equally mystified.

While we all stare at each other stupidly, I think it’s time for some rampant speculation.

  • Branson is shutting down Virgin Atlantic and is using the airplanes as personal skis in his new world record: skiing down Mt. Everest on airplanes. He’ll have one 747 strapped to each leg and one to his ego.
  • Half of coach will be torn out and converted to a hot tub and day spa lounge for “elite” first class members. Economy tickets will thus cost twice as much.
  • Due to the rising price of oil, all passengers are required to bring their own 55 gallon drum of unsweetened crude oil. And you have to pay baggage fees to check it.
  • For every 100lbs of overweight luggage (or passengers) onboard, the crew get to toss one passenger out over the Pacific Ocean.
  • To save costs, London bound flights land on an airstrip in the English Channel and they have to find their way to land.

Regardless of the outcome, VA is hosting a press conference in the City to announce the tomfoolery on June 12. Our own blogger Yaromee Kressmann will be there to get the scoop. Stay tuned for the details.

[via Jaunted]

New Virgin V Australia flights to fly between Sydney and Los Angeles

by Grant Martin on

Is Richard Branson singing you to sleep and feeding you oatmeal in the morning yet? No? Well then he hasn’t yet nuzzled his way completely into your life. Not to fear, you’ll be wearing Virgin loafers and listening to Virgin Radio on your Virgin phone some day soon.

Branson’s newest airline venture, an off-shoot of Virgin-Blue, the new Australian Low Cost Carrier, is called simply V Australia. He plans to fly routes between Sydney and Los Angeles on Boeing 777’s in direct competition to Australia’s national carrier Qantas, who currently has a stranglehold on the market.

Because of tight supply, Qantas has historically been able to charge around 1500$ for a round trip flight between the two cities. Branson hopes to kick off some serious competition on the route and this past Monday announced the first 1,000 tickets would be sold for 777$ — those sold out almost immediately.

For what its worth however, the Chipmunk-eque British billionaire did promise fares in the 375$ range sometime in the future. We’ll see if that ever comes to fruition.

Service is slated to start in December of this year, with tickets already on sale for journeys afterwards. Rest assured — Gadling will be on hand to test drive the new service too. Word on the street is that they’ll also be partnering with Northwest Airlines, so look forward to the potentials of mileage and booking alliances.

Check out V Australia’s website for more info and to book tickets.