28 July 2009: Virgin Galactic unveils its space plane, WhiteKnightTwo

And you can see the video here.



Plus an article here if you want.

In private space development right now there are three companies that are particularly exciting to watch, and those are SpaceX, Bigelow Aerospace, and Virgin Galactic. The first because reducing the cost to go to space will make it more accessible than ever before, the second because Bigelow Aerospace's modules are of revolutionary design, and the third because giving regular people (very wealthy, but still normal people) the opportunity to go to space will result in an explosion in the number of people that have experienced space, even for a brief time. At the moment the total number of people that have ever been to space is a bit over 500, number that will be extremely easy to surpass by Virgin Galactic once it begins operations.

The price is steep enough that even I probably wouldn't sign up (it is after all only a few minutes in space), but for those with more money than they know what to do with it's definitely a bargain. I myself would be most excited at the prospect of being able to make a trip to the Moon, around a few times and then back to Earth, and that's something I would gladly blow my live savings on.