Multi-mission WhiteKnightTwo unveiled

MOJAVE SPACEPORT — The eyes of the world were on Mojave Airport/Spaceport Monday morning as the largest all-composite airplane ever built was unveiled to the news media and some of the 270 people it will help launch into space.

While designed to launch SpaceShipTwo into space from about 48,000 feet, carrying “ordinary people” rather than highly-trained government astronauts, like its predecessors WhiteKnightOne and Proteus it will also launch and carry satellites and other gear on scientific missions, making it a truly multi-mission airplane.

WhiteKnightTwo, christened “Eve” after Sir Richard Branson’s mother in a spray of champagne, is also the largest airplane ever designed and built at Mojave.

WhiteKnightTwo will serve two roles, said Virgin Galactic CEO Will Whitehorn. In addition to opening space to ordinary people, it and its 12 to 15 brothers and sisters will serve as launch platforms for scientific and other payloads.

WhiteKnightTwo’s “open architecture” will allow it to be used to lift “other vehicles capable of doing other things,” into space, Whitehorn said.

It will do this with a level of safety not previously available, he said, adding, “Safety is our North Star.”

Scaled Composites founder Burt Rutan commended the team of Scaled Composites engineers and technicians led by Bob Morgan and Jim Tighe that designed and built the big airplane. He said the aircraft will also be able to launch “flyback boosters” for space experiments, which can land back at Mojave or wherever they’re launched. “That will greatly reduce costs,” he said.

Seeing Earth’s fragility
Giving people the opportunity to see Earth from space “helps one to wake up to its fragility,” Branson said

Will Whitehorn president of Virgin Galactic, said the aircraft will also be the most fuel-efficient ever to fly.

“That really does matter,” Whitehorn said. because it will help stimulate aircraft manufacturers to create all-composite airliners rather than current aircraft which use only partial composite construction.

When that happens it will contribute “to the future of aviation and environmental efficiency world-wide,” Whitehorn said.

Evolution
WhiteKnightTwo evolved from the Virgin Atlantic Global Flyer in which Steve Fossett set a new record for flying around the world, and from Burt Rutan’s creating SpaceShipOne which won the X-Prize in 2004, Whitehorn said.

“When VirginGalactic was born in 1999, Burt’s project was the first one we saw that came close to our vision of safe, energy-efficient access to space,” he told some 150 international journalists and guests. “We set Burt the challenge” of using the concept of SpaceShipOne “to allow thousands of people to realize their ambition to see the beauty of space and the blue planet below them, and experience the weightlessness of zero gravity.”

Ground testing of WhiteKnightTwo will begin soon with flight tests to start in the fall. Testing of SpaceShipTwo, which was shrouded in black plastic, should start in early 2009.
Rutan said 12 to 15 WhiteKnightTwos and 40 to 50 SpaceShipTwos are planned for construction. “We can create 100,000 new astronauts,” he forecast, including, when prices come down, “many of you in this room.”

Longer flights
While SpaceShipOne flights “stayed close to Mojave Airport, SpaceShipTwo will go out to 130 miles or so,” to give passengers longer flights and a larger view,” he said.

Flights will be launched from several places around the globe, to give passengers opportunities to see a variety of views of the planet. Launch sites are being negotiated in Sweden, Scotland, Spain, and Australasia, said Whitehorn.

Launches can also be tailored to passengers of varying ages, “ from young adults to my father, who is 92,” Branson said. For older passengers, G-levels will be lower.

Flights are also planned to circle the globe.
David Cush, CEO of Virgin America, announced that passengers flying on the Branson-owned airline will be able to earn frequent-flyer miles towards space flights, and that the company’s pilots will be trained to fly WhiteKnightTwo and SpaceShipTwo.

Mojave’s role
In his remarks, East Kern Airport District general manager Stu Witt said that what Burt Rutan demonstrated by winning the X-Prize in 2004 “is what brings us all back here today.”

“Our entire operation has but one focus: results. When you enter the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C., from either door, you will be greeted by 11 exhibits from this airport that made their way not only from Burt through flight test and into operation in the skies right above us today.” Witt told a crowd that included Astronaut Buzz Aldrin and other aerospace notables.

Mojave Airport not only tests rocket engines, “it operates rocket-powered aircraft intermixed with conventional aircraft on a daily basis.”

Later tin the day, many of the people that have paid to fly SpaceShipTwo were briefed on the aircraft that will provide training for them in its two passenger cabins and launch them into space.

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who was invited to attend the event, once again snubbed the invitation. Representatives of the state of New Mexico, which has actively recruited aerospace business from Mojave, did attend the event, as they have in the past.

CREATORS of WhiteKnightTwo and SpaceShipTwo fill the huge space between the fuselages of WhiteKnightTwo at Mojave Airport/Spaceport Monday. The Scaled Composites team designed and built the big multi-mission airplane, the largest all-composite craft ever constructed. When picture taking ended, a member of the crew turned to the crowd and said, “Lets’ go back to building spaceships!” PHOTO BY JIM MUMAW

BRIEFING — Sir Richard Branson and Burt Rutan briefed the 150 journalists form all over the world who flew to Mojave for the unveiling of WhiteKnightTwo. PHOTO BY JIM MUMAW

CHRISTENING — As his mother Eve ducks, Sir Richard Branson sprays WhiteKnightTwo (and photographers) with bubbly as he christens the ship, which is named for his mother, one of the world’s first international flight attendants. The name also reflects the aircraft’s role as the first large, all-composite airplanes. BILL DEAVER/Desert News

SMILE — Burt Rutan watches as one of the many photographers at Monday’s rollout of WhiteKnightTwo snaps a photo. BILL DEAVER/Desert News

AEROSPACE LEADERS at Monday’s WhiteKnightTwo rollout included, from left, Virgin Galactic CEO Will Whitehorn, Kevin Peterson, director of NASA-Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base, and Stuart Witt, general manager of the East Kern Airport District. BILL DEAVER/Desert News

GUESTS at the rollout include, from left, East Kern Airport District board members Cathy Hansen, Jim Balentine, and Marie Walker, withy Congressman Kevin McCarthy. BILL DEAVER/Desert News

HUG — Sir Richard Branson hugs Burt Rutan as they pose for photos with members of the Sacled Composites team that built WhiteKnightTwo. BILL DEAVER/Desert News