Aerospace is twice as fast as the successful test launcher sound

The Unity VSS space plane reached a height beyond the reach of commercial airplanes and weather balloons during the latest test.

The Virgin Galactic missile takes commercial spacecraft and two pilots to a height of more than 48km in the atmosphere above the Mojave desert at 2.5 times the speed of sound, according to Newsweek. The third launch of VSS Unity marks the first time Virgin Galactic's space aircraft has entered the middle floor, the middle layer of Earth's atmosphere 48-80.5 km above the ground, the altitude is too high for commercial aircraft. and weather balloon can reach.

VSS Unity may have flown more space than previously calculated.

The management of the company hopes that the first tour of the universe will not be far after this successful flight test. The space plane was propelled by missiles for more than 40 seconds to reach Mach 2.47 (3,026 km / h) speed higher than 52,050 m in the atmosphere.

According to Virgin engineers, the next step is to cross the Kármán boundary above sea level, which is considered to be the end point of the Earth's atmosphere and begin to enter space. But VSS Unity may have flown more space than previously calculated. The new study, published on July 25, shows that the Kármán boundary is actually only 69 - 88 km away from the Earth's surface.

In this April's launch, VSS Unity reached a height of 25,600m at Mach 1.87 (2.309km / h). It was the company's first launch in four years after SpaceShipTwo's failed flight in October 2014. The ship crashed and crashed into the ground after takeoff, causing one pilot to be killed and another pilot injured.

In May, Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Galactic, said the missiles need only make 2-3 more flight tests before using them in commercial flights. Virgin Galactic is competing fiercely with Blue Origin, the aerospace company of billionaire Amazon Jeff Bezos. The new Shepard space of Blue Origin flew over the edge of the universe at a height of 106km, promising to make space tours a reality in the following year, according to Bezos.