Virgin Galactic's share price declined gradually since last June, when the company reached a 52-week high of about $6 per share shortly before the first commercial flight of its VSS Unity suborbital spaceplane.
Virgin Galactic will retire VSS Unity by mid-2024 to devote resources to production of its next-generation Delta-class vehicle.
The updated NASA naming guidelines specify that projects should avoid being named after individuals, focusing instead on unity and inspiration.
An alignment pin fell from the VMS Eve carrier aircraft after deploying VSS Unity during the Galactic 06 flight on 2024-01-26.
Virgin Galactic is operating its suborbital VSS Unity spaceplane for private astronaut flights and is developing a new 'Delta-class' vehicle.
Virgin Galactic plans to shift to a quarterly flight cadence and halt Unity flights entirely by mid-2024.
Virgin Galactic is scheduled to perform the Galactic 06 mission flight of its VSS Unity suborbital spaceplane on January 26 from Spaceport America in New Mexico.
VSS Unity landed on a runway at Spaceport America at 12:56 p.m. Eastern on 2024-01-26.
The VMS Eve and VSS Unity took off from Spaceport America at 12:00 p.m. Eastern on 2024-01-26.
VSS Unity reached a peak altitude of 88.8 km on the 2024-01-26 flight.
Virgin Galactic plans to fly VSS Unity on Galactic 07 in the second quarter of 2024 and possibly a Galactic 08 mission in mid-2024 before retiring Unity.
The Ax-3 pilot is Walter Villadei, an Italian Air Force officer who trained as the backup pilot for Ax-2 and flew on Virgin Galactic’s first commercial VSS Unity suborbital flight in June 2023.
VSS Unity completed five commercial flights between June and November 2023.
Once Unity flights end, staff who work on the vehicles at Spaceport America in New Mexico will move to a new factory near Phoenix that the company expects to complete in the second quarter of 2024 to help assemble the first Delta-class vehicles.
Virgin Galactic may fly a third Unity mission, Galactic 08, around the middle of 2024 but has not decided whether to do so before shifting resources to the Delta class.
VSS Unity completed its fifth commercial suborbital mission on 2023-11-02.
Virgin Galactic may sell some private astronaut seats on Unity for up to $1,000,000 each, compared with the current price of $450,000 per seat.
Virgin Galactic completed Galactic 05, its fifth commercial flight of VSS Unity, on 2023-11-02 carrying two researchers and one private astronaut.
VSS Unity spaceplane took off from Spaceport America in New Mexico at 9 a.m. Eastern attached to the VMS Eve mothership aircraft.
VSS Unity separated from VMS Eve at about 9:45 a.m. Eastern and ignited its hybrid rocket motor to reach a peak altitude of approximately 87.2 km and a top speed of Mach 2.96.