Sturckow, a former NASA astronaut and shuttle commander and Kelly Latimer, the first woman to pilot a Virgin Galactic spaceship, steered them to space and back.

The three space tourists flew with Virgin Galactic astronaut trainer Beth Moses, and all four of them posed for this joyous snapshot while floating weightless during their flight. Rounding out the passenger list was Jon Goodwin, 80, who became the first Olympian in space (he was a canoeist in the 1972 Munich games) and the second person with Parkinson's to fly in space. Schahaff won two tickets in a contest run by Space For Humanity. Riding on the flight were mother-daughter team Keisha Schahaff, 46, and her 18-year-old daughter Anastatia Mayers (who became the youngest person ever to fly in space, according to Virgin Galactic - apparently she is slightly younger than the 18-year-old launched by Blue Origin). The launch, Virgin Galactic's second commercial spaceflight, marked the first time the company flew paying passengers solely for tourism purposes. 10 when the company's VSS Unity space plane launched three space tourists, an astronaut trainer and two pilots on a suborbital spaceflight called Galactic 02. Private astronaut stares at Earth in awe during Virgin Galactic spaceflightįriday, August 11, 2023: Virgin Galactic aced through a major milestone on Aug. With the commonality of space launches growing, the astounding reality that capturing a rocket launch has become a weekly possibility is a marvel in and of itself. While still breathtaking in its own right, this photo of last night's launch is arguably tame compared to other launch photos out there, which is, in part, what makes this image so great for today's photo of the day. To date, SpaceX has launched over 4,000 satellites into orbit, and is on pace to beat the record for number of launches in a year (it also beat that record last year, and the year before that, too).

17, 2023: SpaceX launched a batch of 22 Starlink internet satellites to orbit last night, amidst a heavy cadence of missions for the launch provider.Ī later launch, from SpaceX's facilities in California, was planned for shortly after the Florida liftoff, but was scrubbed. Liftoff of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket with a batch of Starlink satellites, from Space Launch Complex-40, in Cape Canaveral, Florida.

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