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Euston, We Have a Problem... ; As Branson Unveils the Virgin Spaceship, His New Trains Hit Trouble

Posted on: Tuesday, 28 September 2004, 06:00 CDT

SIR Richard Branson unveiled plans yesterday for the Virgin SpaceShip Enterprise, the world's first commercial rocket for 'space tourists'.

Up to 15,000 brave souls are said to be prepared to shell out Pounds 115,000 each for the privilege of flying Virgin into the heavens.

Once the project gets off the ground, they are promised a journey of between two and three hours, including four to five minutes of weightlessness.

But it is to be hoped that the spaceship will avoid the embarrassing teething troubles suffered yesterday by another Virgin enterprise the Pendolino tilting train.

The famous Royal Scot service, seen off from Glasgow by a kilted piper, ground to a halt at Carlisle and had to be replaced after a wheel problem slowed its speed from 110mph to 50mph. Passengers arrived in London two hours late after switching to another train.

Similarly, staff on the 5.28am from Holyhead in North Wales, which failed to start at all because of a problem with electrics, had to telephone ahead to report: 'Euston, we have a problem.' The embarrassing delays, which came on the day Virgin introduced its speeded-up timetable for the troubled West Coast main line, took some of the gloss off Sir Richard's space presentation.

In a deal signed only three days ago, he has formed a new company, Virgin Galactica, and is to spend Pounds 60million building a fleet of spaceships with American aviation pioneer Burt Rutan and multibillionaire philanthropist Paul Allen, who co-founded Microsoft.

Mr Rutan is favourite to win the Pounds 5.7million Ansari X prize, awarded to the first privately-funded rocket to carry passengers into space. His test pilot Mike Melvill showed it was possible in June when he took Rutan's SpaceShipOne 62 miles into the skies in the world's first private manned space flight.

Virgin, which registered its trademark in commercial space flights in the 1990s, aims to use Mr Rutan's expertise at his headquarters in California's Mojave Desert to design a similar craft capable of carrying five passengers.

In January it will start taking Pounds 6,000 deposits from would- be passengers. The ticket includes four days' training and a practice trip in the White Knight turbo fan aircraft which will 'piggy back' the VSS Enterprise 50,000 feet into the sky for its launch.

The rocket will then accelerate to Mach 3, or 2,500mph, within 25 seconds and shoot almost vertically into the blackness of space 80 miles above the Earth.

Passengers, who will not require space suits, will lie almost horizontal to avoid the effects of G-forces. The craft will glide down and land like a conventional aircraft on its undercarriage.

Virgin claimed yesterday that even if it suffered engine failure, like a Pendolino train, the spaceship should be able to float back to safety.

But Mr Rutan, while claiming the flights would be 'at least as safe as the early airlines', admitted: 'No one is going to be able to claim or guarantee that a commercial space operation will be as safe as a 747.' As for his difficulties on the rails, Sir Richard told the Mail: 'When one is talking about over 120 new train sets, there are bound to be some teething problems.'

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