Space tourism passed a major milestone last week when Virgin’s Galactic VSS Enterprise made it’s first crewed flight on July 15, 2010. The two crew members remained attached to the mother ship White Knight 2 during the duration of the 6 hour test flight while they conducted various in flight testing of the navigation and electronics on board. Virgin is hoping to conduct test flights later this year where Virgin Galactic will separate from the mother ship and glide back down to the earth.

Virgin is still on track to launch it’s first space tourists into space sometime in 2012. The 3 1/2 hour flight starts with SpaceShip 2 attached to WhiteKnight 2, where it is taken up to an altitude of 50,000 ft. Then Spaceships 2 detaches from the mother ship and fires it’s jet engine for 70 seconds, which launches the 2 crew members and 6 passengers at a speed of 2,500 mph into space. Once in space, the space tourists will experience once in a life time views of the earth and be weightless for around six minutes before gliding back down to earth. Please Click Here to view an animation of the launch.

For the privilege of seeing and experiencing what only astronauts have experienced to date, a ticket will cost you $200,000 US. This high price tag hasn’t stopped over 300 people from putting down the minimum $20,000 deposit for being one of the first into space. With other companies getting into the space tourism industry, the cost per ticket is expected to drop dramatically in the next 10 years…..so start saving those pennies.

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