Virgin Galactic uses space tech to create new supersonic jet
The space tourism company Virgin Galactic teams up with Rolls Royce to create a new Mach 3 supersonic aircraft.
04 August, 2020
Credit: Virgin Galactic
- Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic has announced a partnership with Rolls Royce.
- The space tourism company will create a new supersonic jet for super-fast travel on Earth.
- The aircraft will travel at Mach 3 – three times the speed of sound.
<p>Virgin Galactic made the hearts of all speed enthusiasts beat faster by <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/03/virgin-galactics-early-supersonic-aircraft-design-partnering-with-rolls-royce.html" target="_blank">announcing a new agreement</a> with Rolls-Royce to create a supersonic passenger jet.</p><p>The space tourism company founded by billionaire <a href="https://bigthink.com/u/richardbranson" target="_blank">Richard Branson</a> revealed an enticing look at the aircraft's design, which would not be taking people to the edge of space but between points on Earth. The move allows the company to leverage its space technology for super-fast travel across the planet. Crucially, the craft would utilize sustainable, next-generation fuel.</p><p>The concept for the supersonic jet, which can potentially disrupt commercial airline travel, has undergone a NASA review. Next, the company is planning to work with the FAA to create a framework for certifying the new aircraft for flight. </p>
<p>Virgin's Galactic's partner in this venture, the British company Rolls-Royce, is, of course, no stranger to supersonic aircraft-making, having built engines for the famous Concordes.</p><p>The first aircraft built will be targeted the speed of Mach 3, which is three times the speed of sound. In other words – a blazing 2300 mph. The plane will be able to carry from 9 to 19 people, cruising at an altitude of over 60,000 feet.</p><p>Virgin Galactic's chief space officer George Whitesides was bullish on the company's achievement:</p><p style="margin-left: 20px;">"We have made great progress so far, and we look forward to opening up a new frontier in high speed travel," he said in a statement.</p>
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Credit: Virgin Galactic
<p>The company has also made great strides in the development of its spacecraft. Check out the recently-released interior of its SpaceShipTwo Unity cabin:</p>
Virgin Galactic Spaceship Cabin Design Reveal
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Why space garbage is more lethal than a bullet
Trash on earth is pretty bad. But space trash is at a whole other level.
30 July, 2018
Trash on earth is pretty bad. But space trash is at a whole other level. Imagine how much damage just a single screw can make when it's hurtling right at you at 17,500mph. You can follow Michelle Thaller on Twitter at @mlthaller.
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Why Elon Musk hopes the Falcon Heavy launch will spark ‘new space race’
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is encouraging aerospace companies to up their game after successfully launching the most powerful rocket since NASA's Saturn V.
07 February, 2018
Falcon Heavy launches at Cape Canaveral, photo by Jim Watson/Getty
<p dir="ltr"><span>SpaceX CEO Elon Musk wants a new space race, and it’s hard to argue with his reason why. </span></p><p dir="ltr">“Space races are exciting,” Musk <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/falcon-heavy-space-race-elon-musk-spacex-blue-origin-2018-2" target="_blank">said</a> at a press conference on Tuesday, adding that a new space race could “<span id="docs-internal-guid-64bf9f88-73dc-4b95-7b48-0e867f9a2708"><span>open up a sense of possibility.”</span></span></p><p dir="ltr">It’s also hard to argue with the fact that Musk’s aerospace company, <a href="http://www.spacex.com/" target="_blank">SpaceX</a>, is dominating that race after Tuesday’s (mostly) successful launch and landing of Falcon Heavy, the most powerful rocket since Saturn V.</p><p dir="ltr"><img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8xODI0MTI4MS9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY1ODI4ODI1Mn0.Dapawn2djyYeblW_N_qQl2QlEANq1l1YhjAfZRi9dgQ/img.png?width=980" id="f135c" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="5630593b11b24ffbe5e9690f05421700" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image"></p><p dir="ltr"><span><span id="docs-internal-guid-64bf9f88-718c-54ba-8efd-104ab3acc28f"><span>After several delays, the SpaceX rocket launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida at 3:45 p.m. ET. </span></span>The </span><span>payload was Musk’s personal Tesla Roadster, and the plan was to send the red sports car to orbit the Red planet. But t</span>hat didn’t quite work out. Musk Tweeted on Tuesday that the Roadster had overshot the Mars trajectory and was headed for the Asteroid Belt instead.</p><blockquote></blockquote><p dir="ltr" lang="en">Third burn successful. Exceeded Mars orbit and kept going to the Asteroid Belt. <a href="https://t.co/bKhRN73WHF">pic.twitter.com/bKhRN73WHF</a></p> <p>— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/961083704230674438?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 7, 2018</a></p> <p><script src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"> </p><p dir="ltr">Still, you can watch a live stream of the Roadster careening through space, piloted by a dummy <span id="docs-internal-guid-64bf9f88-7196-40e9-a8a0-599c4fe4216d">who, if he had ears and if space weren’t an eternally noiseless vacuum, <a href="https://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/rock/8098569/elon-musk-falcon-heavy-rocket-bowie-space-oddity-tesla" target="_blank">would hear</a> David Bowie’s “Space Oddity” blare from the car stereo.</span></p><p><span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="430b4a6313bcf27bfb8098a9b3b521b5"><iframe type="lazy-iframe" data-runner-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/y3niFzo5VLI?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span></p><p dir="ltr">The only other malfunction of the day was the apparent loss of the rocket’s central core, which delivered the payload into space but later smashed into the Atlantic Ocean after missing its landing pad on a drone ship.</p><p dir="ltr"><span>“The centre core hit water at 300 miles per hour and took out two of the engines of the drone ship,” Musk said, adding that it landed about a football field away from the landing pad.</span></p><p dir="ltr">SpaceX isn’t completely sure what happened to the core, but Musk <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/02/musk-falcon-heavy-soars-core-180207054158335.html" target="_blank">said</a>:</p><p dir="ltr"><span>“If we got the footage ... that sounds like some pretty fun footage if the cameras didn't get blown up as well, then we'll put that up ... for – you know – just the blooper reel.”</span></p><p dir="ltr"><span>Falcon Heavy’s pair of side boosters were more graceful, sticking their landing </span><span>in near-perfect unison at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.</span></p><p><span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="ead19611cfe2115a14ab7451ae9fe51c"><iframe type="lazy-iframe" data-runner-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/l5I8jaMsHYk?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span></p><p dir="ltr">After personally inspecting the boosters, Musk <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/06/after-falcon-heavy-success-elon-musk-wants-a-new-space-race.html" target="_blank">said</a> SpaceX will be able to reuse them if it wants. This would allow SpaceX to recoup a sizeable portion of its $500 million total investment in Falcon Heavy, all of which came from private money. It’d also give the aerospace company a huge advantage over its competitors in the new space race.</p><p dir="ltr">Unlike the Cold War, this space race has many participants. One is Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin, which in 2015 made history by achieving the first vertical landing from space with its New Shepard rocket. Bezos wished Musk luck on Twitter before Tuesday’s launch. Musk replied with a <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/960550111632875525?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2Felonmusk%2Fstatus%2F960550111632875525" target="_blank">kiss emoji</a>.</p><p><span id="docs-internal-guid-64bf9f88-71a0-9030-825c-47fb2d756d5d"> </span></p><p dir="ltr"><span>Other SpaceX competitors include Planetary Resources, a company that seeks to mine asteroids for natural resources; Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic, which aims to provide affordable space tourism; and Moon Express, a Florida-based company that wants build a business transporting people to and from the moon.</span></p><p dir="ltr">Musk <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/falcon-heavy-space-race-elon-musk-spacex-blue-origin-2018-2" target="_blank">told</a> reporters on Tuesday that he hopes the launch will cause these companies, as well as national space programs, to up their game.</p><blockquote/><p dir="ltr"><span>“I think it’s going to encourage other companies and countries to say, ‘Hey, if SpaceX, which is a commercial company, and it can do this, and nobody paid for Falcon Heavy, it was paid with internal funds,’ then they could do it, too. So I think it’s going to encourage other countries and companies to raise their sights and say, ‘We can do bigger and better,’ which is great.”</span></p><div><span> </span></div><div class="video-full-card-placeholder" data-slug="elon-musk-on-founding-spacex" style="border: 1px solid #ccc;">
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Stephen Hawking, Given Two Years to Live in 1963, Is Going To Space Over 50 Years Later
Stephen Hawking has accepted an offer to go to space. He's one of the world's most famous scientists, who's been paralyzed due to ALS for much of his life.
24 March, 2017
Dr. Stephen Hawking delivers a speech entitled 'Why we should go into space' on April 21, 2008, at George Washington University's Morton Auditorium in Washington, DC. (Photo by Paul. E. Alers/NASA via G
<p class="p1">Stephen Hawking gave an <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_FDFY-SJ-4" target="_blank">interview to Piers Morgan on “Good Morning Britain”</a>, where he confirmed that he’ll be going to space on Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic spaceship. Branson actually <a href="https://www.virgin.com/richard-branson/professor-stephen-hawking-and-virgin-galactic" target="_blank">offered him the trip in 2015</a> for free, and Hawking says “<span class="s1">since that day, I have never changed my mind.”</span></p> <p class="p4">When the flight will be we don’t yet know. Virgin Galactic’s <strong>SpaceShipTwo</strong> was <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jimdobson/2015/07/28/virgin-galactic-spaceshiptwo-tells-billionaire-passengers-fall-2017-is-new-launch-date/#664f5bb87da2" target="_blank">previously slated</a> to launch at the end of 2017, but no hard date has been announced yet.</p> <p class="p5"><span class="s2">Hawking’s spaceflight will be an amazing feat for the 75-year-old scientist, known for his work in physics and cosmology, adding another chapter to an already remarkable life. When he was only 21, he was diagnosed with </span><span class="s3"><strong>amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) </strong>also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. This rare neurogenerative disease is deadly and Hawking was told he had <strong>2 years to live</strong>. </span></p> <p class="p5"><span class="s3">50+ years later, Hawking is still going strong (and going to space). Paralyzed and confined to a wheelchair, speaking through a specially-designed computer system since 1985, the scientist has achieved more than most do in a lifetime, not letting the debilitating disease slow him down.</span> </p> <p><span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="5d693a44746087c4e805c2b1bc722801"><iframe type="lazy-iframe" data-runner-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Y7ix6HHL-JM?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span></p> <p class="p5"><span class="s3">Hawking has done groundbreaking work on <strong>black holes</strong>, discovering (along with James Bardeen and Brandon Carter) four laws of black holes mechanics.</span></p> <p class="p5"><span class="s3">His 1974 “<strong>Hawking radiation</strong>” theory that black holes are slowly evaporating due to particles robbing them of energy can still land him a Nobel Prize as <a href="http://www.express.co.uk/news/science/664230/stephen-hawking-black-hole-nobel-prize-hawking-radiation" target="_blank">recent research</a> appears to prove it.</span></p> <p class="p5"><span class="s3">He has also done outstanding work on gravitational <strong>singularities</strong>, one-dimensional points that have infinite mass in infinitely tiny spaces. Cooperating with mathematician Roger Penrose, Hawking proved the existence of singularities and proposed key theorems on their origins. </span></p> <p><img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8xODMzODk3OS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY1MjI5MDkzOH0.BEYeZZ5IdBCRRJRg2l4KLmfN1Q8DoKSCkp09rLPhzb8/img.jpg?width=980" id="76be5" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="c9c837dcba36a5f4cae0ea0254dc665c" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image"></p> <p class="p5"><em>Stephen Hawking, date unconfirmed but likely in 1990s. Courtesy: NASA, Starchild Learning Center</em>.</p> <p class="p5"><span class="s3">His other scientific achievements include pioneering work on <strong>cosmic inflation</strong> and the early state of the universe (which Hawking proposed had no time or beginning). </span></p> <p class="p5"><span class="s3">Hawking is also famous for being one of the world’s most popular science educators, writing numerous books like the bestseller “A Brief History of Time,” which sold more than 10 million copies. </span></p> <p class="p5"><span class="s3">How did Hawking, who also has been a professor of mathematics at University of Cambridge for the 30 years, thrive despite the illness? In an <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/stephen-hawking-als/" target="_blank">interview with Scientific American</a>, ALS expert and professor of neurology Leo McCluskey, called Hawking “an outlier”. His case is exceptional and probably represents just a few percent of ALS patients. If Hawking developed the disease while still a teenager, it could be a “juvenile-onset” variant that progresses very slowly. He has also had great care.</span></p> <p class="p5"><span class="s3">How will Hawking fare in space? We don’t know the details of Virgin Galactic flight yet but Hawking seems quite enthusiastic:</span> </p> <blockquote><p class="p7"><span class="s3">“I can tell you what will make me happy, to travel in space. I thought no one would take me but Richard Branson has offered me a seat on Virgin Galactic and I said yes immediately.”</span></p></blockquote> <p class="p7"><span class="s3">You can see this segment from the interview here: </span></p> <p><iframe frameborder="0" height="290" scrolling="no" src="http://www.washingtonpost.com/video/c/embed/9f21d4dc-0d92-11e7-aa57-2ca1b05c41b8" width="480"></p></iframe></p>
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