Virgin spacecraft debris show it may have broke up in flight
November 02, 2014 11:40
Investigators looking into what caused the crash of a Virgin Galactic prototype spacecraft that killed one of two test pilots said a 5-mile path of debris across the California desert indicates the aircraft broke up in flight.
"When the wreckage is dispersed like that, it indicates the likelihood of inflight breakup," National Transportation Safety Board Acting Chairman Christopher A Hart said late last night.
Learning where aircraft parts fell will help investigators determine when and how the breakup occurred, he said.
The crash almost certainly dashed founder Richard Branson's goal of starting commercial suborbital flight next spring, but the mogul said that while he remained committed to civilian space travel "we are not going to push on blindly."
In grim remarks at the Mojave Air and Space Port, where the craft known as SpaceShipTwo was under development, Branson gave no details of Friday's accident and deferred to the NTSB, whose team began its first day of investigation yesterday.