Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo Crashes in New Setback for Commercial Spaceflight
The New York Times 31/10/14
SCIENTIFIC SHIELD: Society and technology
SUMMARY:
SpaceShipTwo, a rocket plane that was meant to carry well-heeled tourists on short if expensive rides to space, crashed in the Mojave Desert on Friday during a test flight, killing one of the two pilots. The other pilot was taken to the hospital with major injuries.
The cause of the accident is thought to be the change of the fuel to another one.
SpaceShipTwo is a prototype commercial spaceship by Virgin Galactic. Like its smaller predecessor, SpaceShipOne, the craft is designed to be lifted aloft by a carrier plane, then released. It fires a rocket engine to reach the upper atmosphere, then glides to a landing.
It was the second major accident in a week for the commercial space industry, which has been widely promoted in recent years as an alternative to costly government programs.
A second SpaceShipTwo plane is currently under construction.
This video shows us a flight of the Space Ship Two:
CRITICAL APPRAISAL:
Although those accidents I think that the space flights could be a way for travelling faster and further than using a conventional plane.
The unic drawback is the money because a seat in the Space Ship Two cost 250.000 $.
Nowadays only rich people and goverments use this tipe of transport but maybe with time we would say that we take our space ship to go to the moon.
The picture shows the ship during the flight:
GLOSSARY:
Space Ship: A manned spacecraft.
Spacecraft: A vehicle for travel beyond the earth's atmosphere.
