WhiteKnightTwo Test Flight

Scaled Composites' twin fuselage carrier aircraft WhiteKnightTwo made its first test flight yesterday morning over Mojave, California, and everything went well. It was the first of a series of test flights before the craft will be put into service.

WhiteKnightTwo is designed to carry payloads to high altitudes. From there, most of the payloads will use their own rockets to go on suborbital flights that reach the edge of space. Various researchers are now working on developing experiments in a range of fields that could take advantage of a few minutes of microgravity. At some point, small probes might even be able to reach orbit using the WhiteKnight platform.

The most famous payload of WhiteKnightTwo, however, will be SpaceShipTwo, which will carry tourists on suborbital flights under the Virgin Galactic banner. The first SpaceShipTwo is currently under construction, but VG plans to begin commercial flights by late 2010.