Enlarge / Virgin Galactic's VSS Unity rocket plane takes off under the fuselage of its carrier aircraft in this photo from a previous test flight. (credit: Virgin Galactic)
Virgin Galactic is preparing for its first commercial flight to the edge of space on Thursday, with three Italian researchers set to ride a rocket plane on a government-sponsored suborbital research mission over New Mexico alongside three Virgin employees.
The milestone mission comes after more than a decade of test flights of Virgin Galactic’s air-launched rocket-powered vehicles and will be the company’s sixth flight to travel higher than 50 miles (80 kilometers), the boundary of space recognized by NASA and the Federal Aviation Administration.
Virgin Galactic plans to livestream the commercial flight beginning at 11 am EDT (1500 UTC). The company’s large carrier jet, called VMS Eve, will take off from a runway at Spaceport America in New Mexico and climb to an altitude of about 45,000 feet, where it will release the VSS Unity rocket plane to ignite its motor and start the climb to suborbital space.
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