Virgin Galactic boss Richard Branson says he hopes to travel to space 'in the middle of the year'.
The 69 year old says he is training hard for the mission, and told CBS This Morning 'my aim is to have the body of a 30 year old when I go to space.'
He also revealed the firm is finalizing plans to move to a 'spaceport' in New Mexico where its flights will operate.
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The 69 year old (center) says he is training hard for the mission, and told CBS This Morning 'my aim is to have the body of a 30 year old when I go to space.'
'I hope to go up in the middle of this year myself, we have another test flight taking place in a few weeks, then another one, and another one, then we move to New Mexico where we have a beautiful spaceport,' he said.
As the company prepares to transition from its test programme, it laid off around 40 employees earlier this month, it has been revealed.
Employees at both Virgin Galactic and partner The SpaceShip Company, which builds the vehicles that Virgin flies, were let go.
'Recently we separated a small number of our team in order to position our organization for the drive to commercial operations following our successful recent spaceflight, and make room for new skill sets that we need to bring in over the course of this year,' a spokesperson for Virgin Galactic said.
Ahead of the move, Virgin also announced a deal with Under Armour to develop space apparel and footwear for astronauts, engineers and fans.
It will also create an astronaut training program that includes fitness and nutrition advice.
Last month Virgin Galactic reached the edge of space for the first time, in a milestone accomplishment for Richard Branson's space tourism endeavors.
The aerospace firm's SpaceShipTwo craft reached a boundary more than 50 miles above Earth on Thursday morning for the first time, after blasting off on a critical flight test in the Mojave Desert.
To do this, the company had to push its rocket motor to the longest burn duration yet, 'resulting in us going higher than we have before.'
In addition to its pilots, the aircraft carried NASA payloads for the first time, in effort to bring it as close as possible to commercial weight.
SpaceShipTwo safely touched back down to Earth less than 15 minutes after achieving its highest flight yet and hitting speeds of nearly three times the speed of sound.
Virgin Galactic has reached the edge of space for the first time, in a milestone accomplishment for Richard Branson's space tourism endeavors. The aerospace firm's SpaceShipTwo craft reached a boundary more than 50 miles above Earth on Thursday morning after blasting off on a critical flight test in the Mojave Desert
'Today, for the first time in history, a crewed spaceship, built to carry private passengers, reached space,' Virgin Galactic founder Richard Branson said from the flight line after the successful flight.
'Today we completed our first revenue generating flight and our pilots earned their Commercial Astronaut Wings. Today, we have shown that Virgin Galactic really can open space to change the world for good.'
Over the course of just under an hour after taking off, the tandem aircraft climbed higher and higher before eventually separating at more than 50,000 feet above the surface.
Pilots Mark 'Forger' Stucky and CJ Sturckow fired up SpaceShipTwo's rocket motor at 11 a.m., bringing the craft to Mach 1.4 speed seconds later.
In less than a minute, it achieved Mach 2.9 - or 2.9 times the speed of sound. And, within a matter of seconds, the craft was at '250,000ft and rising,' hitting the 50-mile mark just 2 minutes after separation.
'SpaceShipTwo, welcome to space,' Virgin Galactic tweeted.
'This is a momentous day and I could not be more proud of our teams who together have opened a new chapter of space exploration,' Branson said afterwards.
'Today, for the first time in history, a crewed spaceship, built to carry private passengers, reached space,' Virgin Galactic founder Richard Branson said from the flight line after the successful flight. One of the pilots can be seen in the cockpit above during the flight
Virgin Galactic's SpaceshipTwo can be seen as it takes off for a suborbital test flight of the VSS Unity on December 13, 2018, in Mojave, California
Virgin Galactic uses an altitude of 50 miles (80 km) to designate the boundary of space.
This is used by NASA and the U.S. Air Force for awarding astronaut wings.
'For Virgin Galactic, the major milestone that we perceive is the altitude at which NASA and Air Force folks get their astronaut wings, which is 50 miles,' George Whitesides, chief executive of Virgin Galactic, said last month.
The long-held view, however, is that the edge of space begins higher than this, at an altitude of 62 miles (100km).
Branson shared a photo of himself 'on the flightline' as he watched from below. The founder has previously said his space tourism firm will carry passengers beyond orbit 'not too long after' this milestone - with him on the first flight.
Virgin Galactic was guarded about the details of its flight test ahead of takeoff.
But, shortly after 10 a.m., the firm tweeted that its WhiteKnightTwo cargo craft had launched carrying SpaceShipTwo.
From then on, the two craft sailed smoothly upward for several thousand feet before separation.
The Dec. 13 test marks SpaceShipTwo's longest burn duration yet, at 60 seconds.
This, as hoped, pushed the craft to a point Virgin considers to be the edge of space, at around 50 miles above the surface.
With that milestone completed, the firm is now hoping to push its craft even farther.
'We will now push on with the remaining portion of our flight test program, which will see the rocket motor burn for longer and VSS Unity fly still faster and higher towards giving thousands of private astronauts an experience which provides a new, planetary perspective to our relationship with the Earth and the cosmos,' Branson said after the flight.
'Ever since I watched the moon landings as a child I have looked up to the skies with wonder,' Branson said. 'Today, as I stood among a truly remarkable group of people with our eyes on the stars, we saw our biggest dream and our toughest challenge to date fulfilled.' The founder couldn't hold back tears as the craft reached new heights
Virgin Galactic founder Richard Branson shared a stunning look from the cockpit a few hours after the successful test flight, showing the pilots' view of Earth from miles above
Branson says the achievement marks the first time a crewed craft designed to carry private passengers has made it to space. The company's definition of the edge of space, however, sits lower than the widely accepted space boundary said to be at 62 miles high
Pilots Mark 'Forger' Stucky and CJ Sturckow fired up SpaceShipTwo's rocket motor at 11 a.m., bringing the craft to Mach 1.4 speed seconds later. In less than a minute, it was at Mach 2.9 - or 2.9 times the speed of sound
The fledgling space firm owned by billionaire Richard Branson will carry four research payloads that are part of the NASA Flight Opportunities Program.
These include looking at hoe dust swirls on asteroids and in space, looking into the feasibility of life support systems for deep-space habitation, growing food in space and reducing the impact of vibrations on payloads going into space.
The formal names and an explanation of what they aim to find are outlined below:
Collisions Into Dust Experiment (COLLIDE)
One of the experiments on-board the Virgin Galactic flight, known as COLLIDE, will help further refine the understanding of dust particles on planetary surfaces.
The microgravity of suborbital flights will allow the researchers to gather data useful for designing exploration architectures at the Moon, Mars and beyond.
COLLIDE will simulate the dusty surface of an asteroid and a surface impact and collect high-quality video of the dust dispersing.
Microgravity Multi-Phase Flow Experiment for Suborbital Testing
The interactions of
