Space

DATE=9/27/2004

TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT

TITLE=BRITAIN / SPACE (L-ONLY)

NUMBER=2-319279

BYLINE=MICHAEL DRUDGE

DATELINE=LONDON

CONTENT=

VOICED AT:

HEADLINE: Branson Plans Commercial Space Flights

INTRO: British airline magnate Richard Branson says his company will begin launching paying customers into outer space by 2007 on the world's first commercial space flights. Correspondent Michael Drudge has more from the VOA News Center in London.

TEXT: The British entrepreneur who established Virgin Atlantic Airways, Richard Branson, announced plans Monday for a commercial space venture, with financial and technical partners from the United States.

///BRANSON ACT///

"Today is truly an historic day, for I think it will bring the dream of space travel for many millions closer to reality. Today, I am pleased to launch our new company, Virgin Galactic, and to announce our plans to build and launch, within three years, the first of Virgin's fleet of space ships, the VSS Enterprise, a spaceship designed to carry fare-paying passengers on a journey to the stars."

///END ACT///

Mr. Branson says the first flights will take off from California's Mohave Desert and last about two or three hours. There will be five passengers aboard, and each ticket will cost about 200-thousand dollars. All the seats, Mr. Branson joked, will be first class.

Mr. Branson's technical partner is Burt Rutan, who built the SpaceShipOne craft that in June became the first manned commercial vessel to go into outer space.

The project will have financial support from Paul Allen, the billionaire co-founder of Microsoft, whose company, Mohave Aerospace Ventures, bankrolled the SpaceShipOne venture.

SpaceShipOne is scheduled for two more launches in quick succession, one on Wednesday and another on October 4th, in an attempt to win the $10 million Ansari X Prize. The award has been offered to the first private three-seat spacecraft to launch twice within two weeks. A single test pilot will fly SpaceShipOne, but it will be weighted as if three people were aboard.

Mr. Branson says an agreement was signed late Saturday with Mr. Allen and Mr. Rutan for Virgin to license SpaceShipOne's technology in a deal that could be worth up to 25-million dollars over the next 15 years.

The British airline magnate said up to three-thousand passengers could fly to space during the first five years of the project, and he predicts that future ventures will establish a space hotel and a base on the Moon for paying customers. (Signed).

NEB/MWD/FC/AWP