Power for Space Tourism

摘要

IT TOOK OUST 60 SECONDS for Virgin Galactic's RocketMotorTwo to secure its place in history. That's how long VSS Unity pilots Mark "Forger" Stucky and Frederick "CJ" Sturckow fired the 15-foot, 1,500-pound engine on December 13, 2018, sending Virgin's SpaceShipTwo into space. After being ferried to an altitude of around 45,000 feet by the WhiteKnightTwo aircraft, Unity propelled itself to an altitude of 51.4 miles and a speed of Mach 2.9. The flight earned the spaceship's powerplant a certification from Guinness World Records as the "most powerful hybrid rocket to be used in [crewed] flight."