Elegant Resorts Partner With Virgin Galactic to Make Space Travel a Reality
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Elegant Resorts Partner With Virgin Galactic to Make Space Travel a Reality
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Category: Worldwide - Industry economy -
Trends / Expert's advice
This is a press release selected by our editorial committee and published online for free on 2008-08-22
Unveiling of 'Eve' Mothership heralds a new era of travel with Elegant
Resorts and Virgin Galactic
Space travel will
become reality for people from all walks of life when Virgin Galactic
launches its public flights into space. Elegant Resorts are the only
company appointed by Virgin Galactic to sell this unique experience in the
UK, Russia and CIS.
Justine Pitt, Product Manager at Elegant Resorts, commented: "We have
already experienced some amazing firsts with Virgin Galactic since our
appointment last July, enabling us to give our clients first-hand knowledge
of the whole Virgin Galactic Experience -- including a simulated trip into
space in the NASTAR Center's Space Training Centrifugal Simulator where we
achieved G-forces upwards of 3G's, a private unveiling of the spacecraft
models in New York back in January with Richard Branson and Burt Rutan, and
now the unveiling of EVE."
The rollout represents another major milestone in Virgin Galactic's
quest to launch the world's first private, environmentally benign, space
access system for people, payload and science. Christened "EVE" in honour
of Sir Richard's mother, who performed the official naming ceremony, WK2 is
both visually remarkable and represents ground-breaking aerospace
technology. It is the world's largest all carbon composite aircraft and
many of its component parts have been built using composite materials for
the very first time. At 140 ft, the wing span is the longest single carbon
composite aviation component ever manufactured.
WK2 will be able to support up to four daily space flights, is able to
carry out both day and night time operations and is equipped with a package
of highly advanced avionics.
Sir Richard Branson, Founder of Virgin Galactic added: "As usual, Burt
and the Scaled team have created a beauty and this is a very proud day for
us all. The rollout of WhiteKnightTwo takes the Virgin Galactic vision to
the next level and continues to provide tangible evidence that this most
ambitious of projects is not only for real but is making tremendous
progress towards our goal of safe commercial operation. We are naming it
EVE after my Mother, Eve Branson but also because it represents a first and
a new beginning, the chance for our ever growing group of future astronauts
and other scientists and payload specialists to see our world in a
completely new light. I for one can't wait!"
Elegant Resorts is Virgin Galactic's only Accredited Space Travel Agent
for the UK. The Elegant Resorts Space Team are taking bookings on 01244 897
003 and have already confirmed a number of seats to date.
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