Three Italians Successfully Launched Into Earth Orbit With Virgin Galactic Space Tourism

Image Credit: dock. Twitter Virgin Galactic

JAKARTA - Virgin Galactic has finally successfully launched its first commercial flight mission, Galactic 02 on a Unity spacecraft.

Unity glided at 10:30 a.m. ET into orbit with a maximum altitude of 85.1 kilometers for 58 minutes and returned to successful landing at 11:42 a.m. ET at Spaceport America, New Mexico.

The spacecraft was launched from Eve's aircraft carrier at an altitude of 44,500 feet, reaching a maximum speed of 2.88 Mach during its maiden tourist mission.

.@VirginGalactic has completed its inaugural commercial spaceflight from Spaceport America, carrying 13 research payloads and 3 crew from the Italian Air Force & the National Research Council of Italy to space. Ben fatto #Galactic01 https://t.co/7Yh56FGpIU pic.twitter.com/C6h04A9smV

— Virgin (@Virgin) June 29, 2023

.@VirginGalactic has completed its inaugural commercial spaceflight from Spaceport America, carrying 13 research payloads and 3 crew from the Italian Air Force & the National Research Council of Italy to space. Ben fatto #Galactic01 https://t.co/7Yh56FGpIU pic.twitter.com/C6h04A9smV

The flight this time was led by Walter Villadei, a colonel in the Italian Air Force, Angelo Landolfi, a doctor and lieutenant colonel in the Italian Air Force, and Pantaleone Carlucci, a researcher at the Italian National Research Council, who also carries 13 research payloads in it.

The three of them are paid passengers. They were also accompanied by Colin Bennett, Virgin Galactic's own astronaut instructor who played a role in supervising missions from within the cabin.

It is known that the successful flight was the first time in nearly two years Unity has reached suborbital altitude, paving the way for Virgin Galactic to officially launch its commercial trip.

The next mission, Galactic 02 will be launched in early August, after which the company plans to send a commercial crew into space every month for 450,000 US dollars (Rp 6.7 billion) per ticket.