Virgin Galactic VMS Eve at EAS Airventure 2009 in Oshkosh

[AaronISB]

it looks like an airplane with a Siamese twin

[BritishPrashant]

0:56 Runaway grandpa!

[JavyMetal66]

/watch?v=C3WqXp6QvW0

[pgjr00]

if it breaks in two, do you end up with 2 independent and airworthy aircraft?

[ilion12345]

@pgjr00 Haha Of course not, the wings wouldn't be even, but I'm assuming your joking.

[KarriKoivusalo]

Twin fuselage construction doesn't create a "weak spot" in the wing joint.. It's terribly important here not to think like the plane was lifted from one spot, as if it hangs from a lifting hook. When in flight, the lift distributes to the entire wing surface. The correct visualization is to rest the plane on sand bags by it's wings, instead of hanging the plane from it's wingtips or the center joint.

[KarriKoivusalo]

As for those asking why two fuselages, please consider this; the VSS Enterprise is quite a bit larger than SpaceShipOne was. If it was mounted under the fuselage, the entire plane would sit so high it would need a jumbo jet hangar. It would also still need the twin booms for the landing gear. It makes great sense to omit the central nacelle and instead use twin fuselage layout.

[cjellwood]

This all looks very 1950's to me. I can think of better designs for carrying the mother ship

[ardenwarner]

Over and over people question -- why two fuselages...? I haven't seen a real answer, other than something like "Because they can". I suppose that's an adequate answer if you're Richard B.

[TheMitchy93]

You can all ready buy tickets to go into space on this costing around £200,000

[videosouthafrica]

hope that middle wing is not glued on skew

[campbelldutch75]

snoopyloopy is smokin some craaazy stuff lol.

[r32adt3db]

Holy crap there is a load of T-28's on the tarmac in the background. Impressive!

Not to mention the plane taking off too.

[6525jacob]

my dad worked on ss2 it is awesome

i got to see it in real life

and i touched it

[Tata996]

Modern-day P-38. Nothing special..

[scaremenga]

I have to disagree, look at how thin the wings look, and imagine it holding essentially a whole fuselage with 8 people in it. Not just a P-38. Although the concept is ideally the same.

[loovusfrez]

its a siamese plane

[Lazybum450]

Epicness served with a side of win, would you like some awesome sauce with that?

The engines are really quiet, or is that just the vid?Can't wait to see it carry Spaceshiptwo

[bozy99]

so why did he hook up to planes?

[brianklumb13]

I went to the shwo to watch this. in the middle it will hold a pod that holds like 10 people and it will shoot it just out of the earth's atmposhphere and into space.  but the tickets cost $200,000.

[ique100]

The Virgin's owner is who sponsors Brawn GP,in the F1,right?

[Robusto94]

so are there two pilots?

[gator966]

I can imagine 2 pilots flying this plane and one decides to turn left while the other goes right! lol

[Michael55443]

This plane does not look structurally sound. The joining is really a small area.

[GameTechSupport]

I could imagine if it snaped in the middle the plane will go 360○

[frequentairbusflyer8]

Awesome!

[snowgirl1052]

Wow, you are in m y hometown! Iam going this weekend. Its fun in Oshkosh, as you never know what is going to fly over your house! My Dad drives one of the trams every year there, and he also does volunteer carpentry work. This is the first year he wont be bringing his Taylor craft and Citabria.

[evanatorx]

Can somebody remind me why there are two fuselages?

[airboyd]

The space ship goes in the middle

[evanatorx]

Yes, but why not on the bottom of a standard fuselage? Does the double fuselage airframe provide better aeronautic stability? Are both cockpits utilized?

[airboyd]

It's a "twin boom" design. Essentially it's a symmetrical design to accommodate the payload. There may also be structural and aerodynamic reasons too. Rutan thinks outside the box. Although not the same, take a look at the P-38.

[boomshanka]

There was also the Heinkel 111Z, also a twin boom design, which was used as a towplane for the glider version of the Gigant.

[snoopyloopy]

yea, it would either have to be carried under the wings like the usually do on fighters for drop payloads or internally like b-1 bomber. but if it's on only one wing, the other side has to be balanced. also, it may fly into remainder of plane on launch. ditto (to lesser degree) on internal. if internal, a larger plane has to be designed to hold the capsule. and does it load and release from rear or underneath? twin boom combines ease of wing loading & launch w/ balance advantages of internal.

[leklek69]

@evanatorx because thre aint three

[ilion12345]

@evanatorx It's basically for balance. If there was just one it would be obvious that there were be stability issues. But using the NASA 747 Design for carrying shuttles would be too expensive, and not as efficient. I believe both "cockpits" are used. Also since the spaceship will de-attach during flight, this design better accommodates that need.

[TheGlaive123]

@evanatorx

One side will hold the flight crew, and the other side will hold passengers on their 0-G training mission before their scheduled flight. After the aircraft launches the spacecraft, it will do a series of parabolic dives so that the trainees can experience 0-G before they go into space on the next mission.

[cattleman6420012000]

This is fantastic. I look forward to hearing much more about this.

[guy014]

Can't wait to see it in action.. Carrying people to space on demand. WOW!

Great footage.