
Virgin Galactic reveals initial vehicle design for high speed travel - punnerud
https://www.virgin.com/news/virgin-galactic-reveals-initial-vehicle-design-high-speed-travel
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deleted_account
Mission Concept Review is a milestone in NASA's Program/Project Lifecycle:
[https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/atoms/files/nasa_sy...](https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/atoms/files/nasa_systems_engineering_handbook_0.pdf).

It sits between the "Concept Studies" and "Concept and Technology Development"
phases.

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sunstone
Interesting they are going for this approach rather than the parabolic near
space technique of spaceX. Could these just be different market segments?

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Johnjonjoan
Am I the only one who takes great pleasure in traveling (relatively) slow?
(hyperbole)

Give me a train over a plane any day.

I don't want to seem old fashioned but I think there's great value in seeing
the world go by at a speed you can actually relate to; where the things you
pass still look the same as if you walked by them. I see it as an extremely
value for money sight seeing tour.

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rocelot
Of course, like most things, it's entirely contextual. I agree with you,
there's nothing I enjoy more than just looking out the window of a car, or
train, or plane for that matter -- and if there isn't an urgency, or I'm
traveling for pleasure that's just fine!

Of course if I need to cross a portion of the globe as quickly as possible for
any number of plausible reasons, or I have to cover an enormous distance on a
regular basis, like I'm sure most people would agree, (and I'm sure for a
stiff price) I'd certainly be glad to have the opportunity to take advantage
of a hyperspeed way to do it.

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mchusma
This is great! Let's see a new race between Boom and Virgin for a new
generation of fast planes.

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mchusma
For some quick stats vs Boom: Virgin looks like mach 3, 19 seats. Boom looks
like mac 2.2, 55 seats.
[https://boomsupersonic.com/overture](https://boomsupersonic.com/overture)

