Status: Active
8/11/1961 –
Nationality: American
Type: Private
First Flight: 12/4/1998
Last Flight: 5/25/2023
Frederick Wilford “Rick” Sturckow is an Engineer, retired United States Marine Corps officer, former NASA astronaut, and commercial spacecraft pilot. Sturckow is a veteran of four Space Shuttle missions. He flew on STS-88 and STS-105 as a pilot and STS-117 and STS-128 as a commander. All four missions docked with the International Space Station, making Sturckow one of two people to visit the station four times. Sturckow later was assigned to the Johnson Space Center as a CAPCOM. He left NASA in 2013 to become a pilot for Virgin Galactic.
Virgin Galactic - VG
- Type: Private
- Abbreviation: VG
- Administration: Founder: Richard Branson
- Founded: 2004
- Launchers: VMS Eve
- Spacecraft: VSS Enterprise | VSS Unity
- Country: USA
Virgin Galactic is an American spaceflight company within the Virgin Group. It is developing commercial spacecraft and aims to provide suborbital spaceflights to space tourists. Virgin Galactic’s suborbital spacecraft are air launched from beneath a carrier airplane known as White Knight Two.
