Virgin Galactic Successfully Conducted Glide Test With Newest Spaceship

The last time Virgin Galactic sent a spaceship out into the atmosphere, it didn’t end well. Two years ago, the test ended in a crash, which effectively pushed the company back quite a bit. Fast-forward to the present and a new spacecraft called the VSS Unity has successfully landed back to earth, putting the company one giant leap closer to achieving viable, commercial spaceflight.

The test involved releasing the spaceship about 50,000 feet in the air, allowing it to glide to earth in a free flying mode. The test was conducted over the Mojave desert, starting from the Mojave Air & Space Port, Phys.org reports.

Upon take off, the plane was hoisted by the VMS Eve, which is a WhiteKnightTwo carrier class plane. At maximum altitude, the carrier plane disengaged Unity, thus allowing it to complete its descent back to earth and completing the test.

Unity itself was introduced to the public last February, Gizmodo reports, and has since been paired with Eve during five flights. However, Saturday’s test was the first time that Unity was allowed to do the free flight. Thanks to the successful test, the company is now one step closer to making spaceflight accessible to everyone, instead of the few chosen astronauts and scientists regularly sent to space.

On that note, it would seem that the spaceship is still a long way off to reaching a state that it can become a viable vessel for outer space. On the company’s blog post, Virgin Galactic explains that quite a few tests are needed to be done before Unity can take on passengers bound for the moon.

“This glide flight was the first of many,” the post reads. “We have not yet reached the rocket-powered phase of the test flight program—first we need to gather test flight data to confirm our analyses and calculations about how VSS Unity will perform in a wide variety of real-world flight conditions.”