Branson quits counting to galactic launch

Richard Branson courtesy AFP

Albuquerque Journal - British billionaire Richard Branson says he has “stopped counting” days to the official launch of his space tourism business out of Upham, N.M., because it gets delayed “to the next year, to the next year.” 

The founder of Virgin Galactic made the comments to reporters as he met with students on his first visit to his young persons business school called Virgin Academy in Warsaw, Poland, on Wednesday.

He says it will be at least another 12 or 18 months before the Virgin Galactic venture can offer paid space travel to adventurers, which is generally within previously announced time frames.

That would put the first launch about as early at October of next year or about four months into 2014.

Just last week, a Virgin Galactic official at the International Symposium for Personal and Commercial Spaceflight in Las Cruces said the company tentatively planned to launch its first two-stage flight to the edge of space in December 2013, about 14 months away. Read More News New Mexico (subscription)

Branson quits counting to galactic launch