White Knight: July 2009 Archives

Care of my Flightglobal colleague Jon Ostrower and his Flightblogger blog at 2min 25s into the above video Scaled Composites founder Burt Rutan talks about the life support system that SpaceShip Two and WhiteKnight Two share

credit Flightglobal / caption: A happy Will Whitehorn on 28 July  2009 at Airventure Oshkosh

Virgin Galactic president Will Whitehorn spoke to Hyperbola after the first public demonstration flight of the WhiteKnight Two, which Sir Richard Branson participated in by sitting in the flight engineer's seat. The demo flight took place exactly one year after the 28 July 2008 roll out of the mothership at Mojave air and spaceport. Watch the interview video in the extended portion of this blog post

Above is the left hand seat of WhiteKnight Two's starboard cabin command module with the helmets of its pilot Peter Siebold and co-pilot Clint Nichols. Watch a video of the interior below
In the extended section of this blog post are more exclusive pictures of the cockpit, the rest of the interior of WK2's righthand fuselage and of Virgin Galactic founder Sir Richard Branson preparing for his participation in the demo flight - that took place on the afternoon of Tuesday 28 July here at the EAA Airventure air show in Oshkosh, Wisconsin

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In what is more like a "mega-angel" investor than what would be considered the normal process of raising rounds of private finance Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Group has managed to sell effectively a third of Virgin Galactic. At the Royal Aeronautical Society Virgin Galactic president Will Whitehorn spoke of his confidence of SpaceShip Two flying in the Middle East and of obtaining private finance in the next 12-months. Now we know why. Find the press release below and in the extended portion of this blog post

Oshkosh/Abu Dhabi, 28th July 2009: Abu Dhabi 's Aabar Investments and Virgin Group today announced that they have agreed to enter a strategic partnership, which will see Aabar take an equity stake in the world's first commercial spaceline - Virgin Galactic. To date, Virgin Galactic has been wholly owned and funded by Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Group. The deal, signed today at the EAA AirVenture air show in Oshkosh, Wisconsin attended by Sir Richard Branson, Founder of Virgin Group, and Mohamed Badawy Al-Husseiny, CEO of Aabar. The signing ceremony is taking place alongside Virgin Galactic's new carrier space launch vehicle, WhiteKnightTwo (VMS Eve) which is making its public demonstration flying debut in Oshkosh. Under the deal, Aabar will invest approximately US$280m and take around a 32% stake in Virgin Galactic's holding company, valuing the business at about $900m. The transaction is subject to obtaining regulatory clearances in the United States and elsewhere. Additionally, Aabar has committed $100m (plus transaction cost) to fund a small satellite launch capability, subject to the development of a full business plan. It will also gain exclusive regional rights, subject to regulatory clearances, to host Virgin Galactic tourism and scientific research space flights. Finally, Aabar has plans to build spaceport facilities in Abu Dhabi.

credit Flight/Alan Radecki / caption: see the notch in the bottom of the rudder

In the photo above the new modification to the WhiteKnight Two prototype Eve's rudder, a notch cut into the bottom of it, can be seen and above it, glinting in the sun, are the vortex generators previously added. The photo was taken on Monday 27 July during the mothership's take-off at about 07:37 local time at Mojave air and spaceport as it began its journey to Oshkosh

Scaled Composites founder and chief engineer Burt Rutan told Hyperbola about the latest change to the rudder during a brief chat the aircraft designer had with media after WK2 landed at Wittman regional airport in Oshkosh on Monday 27 July

Watch Flightglobal's interviews about WhiteKnight Two and SpaceShip Two with Virgin group chairman and Virgin Galactic founder Sir Richard Branson and Scaled Composites founder and chief engineer Burt Rutan. As well as Associated Press and the Green Bay affiliate of CBS television Flightglobal got to talk to Rutan and Branson under the wing of WK2 immediately after it landed

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credit Flight/Alan Radecki / caption: WK2 takes-off

On Monday 27 July 2009 Virgin Galactic's mothership WhiteKnight Two takes off from Mojave air and spaceport at 07:37 local time as it begins its four to five hour journey to Wittman regional airport in Oshkosh, Wisconsin for the EAA Airventure air show

Expect video and pictures of its arrival on Hyperbola later today

From 25 July to 14 August Hyperbola will be based in the US and working on the east coast and in Colorado and Utah, on Mountain time. From the public debut of Virgin Galactic's WhiteKnight Two at the EAA AirVenture air show at Oshkosh to the latest on NASA's plans from the 45th Joint Propulsion conference in Denver, Hyperbola will be stateside for the next three weeks

credit Flight / caption: what further control surface changes are being made?

Has Scaled Composites made further changes to the rudder of its WhiteKnight Two prototype Eve?

In the company's online log for its WK2 prototype's flight test 13 it says: "Eval control surface mods, Eval pitot probe relocation, Intstrument approach practice, Pilot LOA practice."

Hyperbola contacted Virgin Galactic and was told by its president Will Whitehorn: "minor refinements [made to control surfaces were] based on learning to date."

Asked which control surfaces had been modified, Whitehorn said: "this is commercially sensitive as it is and Scaled don't give a running commentary to their competitors, that's all they wish to say."

In its 23 April statement Scaled Composites stated that "We concluded the rudder aerodynamic modification tasks following flight 3."

credit: Lukas Wilcocks/Flight  / caption: Whitehorn said that UK space law would stop Virgin Galactic flying

At the Royal Aeronautical Society's 30 June 2009 space tourism conference EADS Astrium's deputy chief technical officer Hugues Laporte-Weywada and Virgin Galactic president Will Whitehorn answered the audiences questions after each giving presentations

Go here to download the audio of that Q&A. While I was not allowed to make a video or audio recording of the actual presentations, because audio recordings are supplied to conference attendees with the proceedings, I was told that the question and answer sessions were not included in the post-conference package