Richard Branson and Virgin advertisementMonday 3/19/12 Mr Branson has sense of humour when doing advertisement, here is one example of Virgin mobile advertisement : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GYiCvxkkYs |
Testflight situationSunday 3/4/12, time 12:17 PM At the moment WhiteKnigtTwo -mothership is having annual maintenance. Rocket motor is being installed into SpaceShipTwo -rocket. This installation will take a couple of months. In summer there will be some glidefligts before rocketmotor will be started and SpaceShipTwo will make her first testflights into space. |
The latest Virgin Galactic video in YoutubeMonday 2/27/12 Virgin Galactic has publishded 26 videos in Youtube, this the latest one. My favorit part in the video starts in 2 minuts when rocket is coming down in wings 'up' position. It seems to be quite rough ride to come back... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6HjHNdWQBg&feature=youtube_gdata_player |
Names of Virgin Galactic shipsMonday 1/30/12 Virgin Galactic has given names to it's ships. The name for the first mothership is VMS (Virgin Mothership) Eve. Eve is Branson's mother name. The second mothership will be named to VMS Spirit of Steve Fossett. Fossett was a good friend of Branson, who died in airplane crash 2007. The first rocket name is VSS (Virgin Space Ship) Enterprise. The second rocket name will be VSS Voyager. Both names are known from Star Trek -series and they both are also names of NASA shuttles. The next rocket names are not know yet. More information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VMS_Eve http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Fossett |
What happened 2011 and what will happen 2012?Sunday 1/1/12, time 8:13 PM In year 2011 the most exciting thing for me was the visit to Spaceport America in October. I did see the planes and I did meet other future astronauts. I wrote a 6 -page article to Tekniikan Maailma in Finland. Virgint Galactic has done more testing and the most important tests were 13 glide flights. It will not take much more time for the first rocket powered flight now. There were 400 people who had reserved the flight in the beginning of the year and now we are about 500. There still 2 persons from Finland who will fly to space. The third Finn has not come yet. The first flight to the space should happen this year and my flight should be in 2013. Before my flight will do Zero-G flight. |
WhiteKnightTwo and RocketMotorTwo testing goes onThursday 12/22/11, time 5:02 PM WhiteKnightTwo has flown now 77 times. http://www.scaled.com/projects/whiteknighttwo_flight_test_summaries At the last flight Dec 06, the rocket was not with it any more. Is that because RocketMotorTwo will be installed to SpaceShipTwo? RocketMotorTwo is tested more, the last time it was used Nov 29. It had first 10 second and then 58 second hot fire. http://www.scaled.com/projects/rocketmotortwo_hot-fire_test_summaries |
Visit to Spaceport America 17.10.2011Saturday 12/17/11 The latest issue of the ”Tekniikan Maailma”, the most appreciated Finnish magazine on the technology field, came out at the end of November 2011 covering my article of the visit to Spaceport America, and now I can finally write and publish some pictures here on my website. I spent a night in Las Crucas, New Mexico, which is the nearest major city close to Spaceport America. The registration for the event took place at the hotel 06:00 the next morning. There were total about 800 persons: future astronauts and their friends, media representatives, students, and employees of the companies involved in the project. A two-hour bus ride took us to the sunny Spaceport America. In New Mexico, there are more than 350 sunny days a year, and the day of the visit was one of them. The temperature in the morning was already over 20 degrees Celcius (over 70 in Fahrenheit). We were offered something to eat and we were given some time to go around and just wonder what the airport was all about. The opening speeches were given by the Governor of New Mexico and by Sir Richard Branson. While they talked, WhiteKnightTwo took off for a flight carrying SpaceShipTwo in her “belly”. The flight lasted for half an hour, with several ascents and descents. It was amazing, very impressive! When the aircraft had landed, we could have a closer look at her, could not, however get inside. A lunch was catered in the hangar. After the lunch, it was time for the speeches, the CEO of Virgin Galactic, George Whitesides, the Governor of New Mexico, some New Mexico officials, and finally Sir Branson again. Speeches were not too long and we gave them a big hand every now and then. The name of the most famous of the astronauts attending here, was Buzz Aldrin. The inauguration ceremony took place after the speeches and we had glasses of champagne to celebrate the occasion. The event closed at 14:00 and we were taken by buses back to Las Cruces. I spent two days at the event. It was really interesting to see the airport and the aircrafts, as well as to meet the other astronauts. I got acquainted e.g. with English, Russian, Canadian, Swedish, Danish and Icelandic “colleagues”. Each had his or her own story to tell why they wanted to go into the space. Gisli Gislason from Iceland is a very joyful person, with him I later exchanged some pictures and videos. He will be the first Icelandic astronaut ever. Many people I talked with, are obviously quite wealthy. For instance, when I asked one Englishman about his opinion about Aston Martin vehicle, he replied that he rather drives his own Bentley. These millionaires seemed to be openly amused by the fact that I am probably the only person who has received some money back from Virgin Galactic. And how? George Whitesides bought from me two T-shirts, with a Finnish text “Suomalainen Astronautti”, for$ 80. One of the T-shirts I gave to Sir Branson, and I naturally explained to him what that the text said , that is “Finnish Astronaut”. I suggested that he should wear the t-shirt at The Nordic Business Forum to be held in Jyväskylä, Finland, next September, where he will be one of the KeyNoteSpeakers. He will certainly include Virgin Galactic in his presentation, as this seems to be his favorite child. And what’s up now? I need to be patient and wait for the next move. Virgin Galactic will continue with rocket engine testing, all the rest is already pretty much ready to go. Perhaps next year this time I will receive another invitation to visit Spaceport America. The Branson family has planned to take the first space flight then. In that party there will be enough of champagne, that’s for sure. |
Tekniikan Maailma 21/2011 SuominauttiWednesday 11/16/11 Today Tekniikan Maailma will publish a story, which I have written. It is a 6 -page story of Spaceport America and all the technical details of Virgin Galactic. It is the front page story. Tekniikan Maailma is the biggest technical magazine in Finland. I will write more stories to Tekniikan Maailma later. "Suominautti Vesa Heilala valmiina avaruusmalle" = The Finnish Astronaut Vesa Heilala is ready for spacetrip. More info Tekniikan Maailman -pages: http://tekniikanmaailma.fi/muu-tekniikka/muut/turistilennot-avaruuteen-alkamassa
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SpaceShipTwo glide flight videoThursday 11/10/11 Virgin Galactic has a lot of videos in Youtube. This is one of the latest ones, it is a recent test flight. SpaceShipTwo glides from 15 km to the ground. It looks great! |
Virign Galactic hires the first commercial astronaut pilotMonday 10/31/11 Keith Colmer is the first pilot, which was selected from 500 applicants to fly WhiteKnightTwo and SpaceShipTwo -vessels- Keith has flown over 5000 hours with 90 different planes. Two more pilots will be selected later. Pilots must be U.S. citizen. |
Galactic Unite meeting in Las CrucesMonday 10/17/11, time 6:53 AM There was a Galactic Unite meeting at Sunday 16th October. The purpose of the Galactic Unite is to help young people to explore space. It is a charity organization, which has already colleced one million dollars. If you give 500 dollars, then one student can have training to make space experiments. http://www.virginunite.com/campaign/USA/Galactic-Unite/ Virgin Galactic personnel and some others spoke at the meeting. After the meeting there was free chat and I could make talk to other Future Astronauts. They all are cool persons and very relaxed. Half the persons where from USA, many from U.K., two from Island, two from Sweden, one from Denmark and many other nationalites. There were about 80 astronauts present. I sold Finnish Astronauts T- shirts for 80 dollars to Virgin Galactic, so I got a little back from the money I have paid for Virgin Galactic. |
Intrepid -museum at New YorkThursday 10/13/11, time 5:53 AM I visited Intrepid -museum at New York. Intrepid is a aircraft carrier, which was used by USA Navy 1943 - 1974. It was also getting astrounauts out of the water in 1960's. Now it is a museum and there are many interesting machines. Concorde, Blackbird, F-16, Mercury -capsule etc. After a couple of years space shuttle Enterprice will get it's now home there. Museum pages www.intrepidmuseum.org |
Travelling to Spaceport America, New MexicoTuesday 10/11/11 Today I will fly from Helsinki to New York. I will stay there a couple of days to take care of jetlag. I will also meet another astronaut, Sital Sal Jain. Sital is a 72 -year old man, who lives in New York. He has travelled a lot, he has visited North and South poles and many other places. On Saturday I will make a 2000 mile internal flight from New York to El Paso. Monday is the day, that I have been waiting for 18 months: I will see the ships, Spaceport America and other astronauts. There will be about 140 astronauts at Spaceport. |
Branson is coming to Jyväskylä, Finland next September!Tuesday 10/4/11 Sir Richard Branson will be the main speaker in the Nordic Business Forum 2012. This is year the main speaker was Al Gore. The forum is held 20. - 21.9.2012. I wonder if Branson has already visited Jyväskylä? I could give him a couple of tips, I did live in Jyväskylä 17 years. More info:http://www.nordicbusinessforum.com/ |
Visit to Spaceport America in OctoberSunday 8/21/11, time 2:52 PM I got the official invitation to Spaceport America. I will fly to El Paso and my hotel is booked in Las Cruses, and from my hotel there is transport to Spaceport. There are program for 2 days. On 16th there is a Galactic Unite meeting and on 17th I will spent a day in Spaceport. On Monday evening there is also evening program. Richard Branson, Virgin Galactic personnel, governor of New Mexico and maybe 100 future astronauts will be there. I will see the Spaceport and the spaceships. That will be very interesting. |
English pages are openedWednesday 7/6/11, time 5:52 PM Today I got ready English pages. Pages and pictures are the same. |
