'I am so proud': Richard Branson aims to reach space nine days before Jeff Bezos

English business magnate, Richard Branson is aiming to beat billionaire Jeff Bezos into space by just nine days. Branson’s Virgin Galactic announced on July 1 that its next test flight would take place on July 11 and revealed that its founder would be one among the six people on board. In the fourth trip to space for Virgin Galactic, all other passengers on its flight would be company employees. The winged rocket ship, first carrying a full crew would blast off from New Mexico.

The company announced its first fully crewed spaceflight on Thursday after the United States Federal Aviation Administration in late June gave Virgin Galactic permission to take paying customers to space. Branson’s firm conducted a successful test flight in May this year.

The announcement came shortly after Amazon founder’s Blue Origin declared that Bezos would be accompanied into space on July 20 by 82-year-old Wally Funk, a female aerospace pioneer. She was denied the chance to be an astronaut in the 1960s due to her gender but not she will accompany Bezos into space and would also be the oldest person ever to make the stunning trip.

‘I am so proud,’ says Branson

In a statement on July 2, Branson said, “I am so proud and excited to be flying to space on Virgin Galactic’s next rocket-powered test flight….It’s one thing to have a dream of making space more accessible to all; it’s another for an incredible team to collectively turn that dream into reality.”

“As part of a remarkable crew of mission specialists, I’m honoured to help validate the journey our future astronauts will undertake and ensure we deliver the unique customer experience people expect from Virgin,” he added.

Branson also said that along with pilots Dave Mackay and Michael Masucci flying VSS Unity, and CJ Sturckow and Kelly Latimer flying VMS Eve, Virgin Galactic founder will be joined by mission crew specialists Beth Moses, Chief Astronaut Instructor; Colin Bennett, Lead Operations Engineer; and Sirisha Bandla, Vice President of Government Affairs and Research Operations. He also said, “I truly believe that space belongs to all of us. After 17 years of research, engineering and innovation, Virgin Galactic stands at the vanguard of a new commercial space industry poised to open the universe to humankind and change the world for good.”

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