By Alex Dobuzinskis
MOJAVE Calif. (Reuters) - A passenger spaceship being developed by
Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic company crashed during a test flight
on Friday near the Mojave Air and Space Port in California, killing one
pilot and seriously injuring the other, officials said.
The crash of the suborbital vehicle, undergoing its first
powered test flight since January over the Mojave Desert, 95 miles (150
km) north of Los Angeles, came days after another private space company,
Orbital Sciences Corp, lost a rocket in an explosion moments after
liftoff in Virginia.
The back-to-back accidents dealt a considerable blow to the
fledgling commercial space launch industry, which has been taking on
more work traditionally done by the U.S. government while expanding
for-profit space markets, including tourism.