The SpaceShiftTwo ship exploded in the air during a test flight from the space station Mojave, north of Los Angeles, and the event ended with the death of the passenger, while the driver was seriously injured, according the California Highway Patrol.
The stricken ship had a capacity of six passengers and two pilots, each equipped with parachutes.
The incident occurred just days after the explosion of a rocket from another company commercial flights into space, Orbital Sciences after its launch from the NASA facility at Wallops Island, Virginia.
The Antares rocket carried a spacecraft unmanned Cygnus over 2 tons of cargo and experiments to the International Space Station (ISS).
Virgin Galactic, the company founded by British billionaire Richard Branson, today described the incident as “a serious anomaly” and said it will work closely with the “relevant authorities” to determine the root of the problem.
The crashed spacecraft spent more than three hours Track awaiting a field team determines whether the conditions were ideal for flying.
The engineers who supervised the conditions this morning at the base of Mogave gave the green light to launch the 09.19 local time (16.19 GMT).
The carrier that transported the ship propelled by a rocket up to about 17 miles above the Earth to start the test flight, landed smoothly, according to Virgin Galactic.
Flight like today are preparing for suborbital flights to the edge of outer space, beyond 100 km altitude.
Branson expected to become the first passenger on a commercial flight into space next year.
In addition to it, more than 800 people have paid or made deposits to eventually travel aboard the spacecraft, from which Passengers will see the Earth with the dark vacuum of space as a backdrop and to experience a few minutes of weightlessness.
The list of stakeholders include American actor Ashton Kuchner, who paid $ 200,000 for the ticket that take you to the border between Earth and outer space, from where you can see the curvature of the planet.
Tom Hanks, Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt and Kate Perry are other celebrities who have bought your ticket space with Virgin Galactic.
The vehicle that exploded in the air this Friday, and whose remains were scattered over a small section of the Mojave Desert in California , is based on the SpaceShipOne prototype, which won 10 years ago the Ansari X Prize, worth $ 10 million, being the first private manned spacecraft to fly in space.
The test flight received special permission from the FAA.
Both Virgin Galactic as the government agency had repeatedly expressed their confidence in the technology behind Spaceship .
Among the companies developing spacecraft for commercial flights into space are XCOR Aerospace, working on a vehicle with two passengers who have dubbed Lynx, and Blue Origin, owned by Jeff Bezos, founder of ecommerce signature Amazon.com.
Branson is scheduled to visit tomorrow Mojave and a team from the National Board of Transportation Safety (NTSB) are persone also in the area. EFE
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