About 45 agents in the US and 100 worldwide are getting certified to sell seats on SpaceShipTwo, the craft developed by Richard Branson’s commercial space travel company, Virgin Galactic.
A model of SpaceShipTwo was unveiled at a New York news conference. A working prototype is expected to be in test flights this summer, and commercial flights could begin in two years.
One of the participants was a Raleigh-based agent, Tony Maupin. He thinks he can sell space travel even if it costs $200,000 for a two-hour trip. He predicts that in 10 years, 50,000 people will have flown into space.
“I’ve wanted to go into space ever since I was a kid,” Mr Maupin said. He said the trips will be safe.
“If anything does happen, if the engine doesn’t work, you just glide back down to Earth,” he said. “It’s extremely safe, probably safer than you and I getting in our car and driving to the beach.”
Report by David Wilkening
