VSS Unity VF-03

Crew

Frederick W. Sturckow

Status: Active
8/11/1961 -
Nationality: American
Type: Private
First Flight: 12/4/1998
Last Flight: 5/22/2021

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.

David Mackay

Status: Active
1/1/1957 -
Nationality: British
Type: Private
First Flight: 6/29/2012
Last Flight: 7/11/2021

Astronaut David William Donald Mackay AFC is the British Chief Pilot of Virgin Galactic, and a former RAF test pilot. He is the first native-born Scot to visit space.

Rocket

SpaceShipTwo – Virgin Galactic

• Family: SpaceShipTwo
• Length: 18 m
• Diameter: 8.2 m
• Launch Mass: 9 T
• Low Earth Orbit Capacity: 0 kg

The SpaceShipTwo was manufactured by Virgin Galactic with the first launch on 2010-10-10. SpaceShipTwo has 53 successful launches and 5 failed launches with a total of 58 launches. The Scaled Composites Model 339 SpaceShipTwo (SS2) is an air-launched suborbital spaceplane type designed for space tourism. It is manufactured by The Spaceship Company, a California-based company owned by Virgin Galactic.

Agency

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.