Virgin Galactic's Upcoming Spaceflights: Dates, Crews, and Research Missions

Virgin Galactic has announced the date and crew for its fifth commercial spaceflight, Galactic 06, set to open on November 2, 2023. The crew will include an unnamed private astronaut, planetary scientist Alan Stern, and bioastronautics researcher Kellie Gerardi. They will conduct research related to the effects of spaceflight on the human body and perform practice activities for future experiments. This flight marks Stern's first trip to space and represents a new era where space is accessible for researchers. Virgin Galactic's space tourism flights use a mothership aircraft to carry its space plane to an altitude of around 50,000 feet before releasing it.