Branson heads to spacecraft crash site with pledge to persevere as probe starts

British tycoon Richard Branson was poised to rally his grieving Virgin Galactic staff in California on Saturday as investigators began probing the spacecraft crash that left one pilot dead and another seriously injured. Describing the tragedy, in which another pilot was seriously injured, as “a devastating loss”, the billionaire businessman said he and his team at Virgin Galactic were doing everything possible to support the pilots’ families. Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo rocket came down in the Mojave Desert in California, having “suffered a serious anomaly” after a test flight conducted by partner business Scaled Composites.

Mojave is also where I want to be – with the dedicated and hard-working people who are now in shock at this devastating loss.

Sir Richard Branson

A problem was discovered two minutes after SpaceShipTwo took off, and teams were sent to the crash site 40 kilometres north of the local airport. Branson said he and his team will co-operate fully with authorities in their investigation into the crash. At a press conference in California, Virgin Galactic chief executive George Whitesides said it was the first time the rocket had been flown using a new fuel formulation. Mr Whitesides said the injured pilot was “as well as could be expected”. Virgin Galactic had hoped to start ferrying wealthy customers to the edge of space in 2015, charging $250,000 per person for a ticket on the company’s six-seater SpaceShipTwo. Experts say Friday’s accident will delay the advent of commercial space tourism by several years.

Galactica Americas