Virgin Galactic Holdings (NYSE:SPCE) Inc. late last week flagged a delay to its first commercial research mission with the Italian Air Force to mid-October due to a potential manufacturing defect. There has been a lot of hushed talk before this about the huge space programme that has been in the time line for a long time now.
It is safe to say that Virgin Galactic does not want to take any risks as this Multi-Million Dollar project cannot at any point fail. Whilst they are working on a breakthrough for humanity in the future it seems that they will not be able to keep up with the provided time line as they have faced some bumps on the road.
The company said the delay in the mission, named “Unity 23” was unrelated to the pending resolution of a probe by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
Virgin Galactic said on Friday a third-party supplier warned of a potential manufacturing defect in a component of the flight control system during test flight preparations.
“At this point, it is not yet known whether the defect is present in the company’s vehicles and what, if any, repair work may be needed,” the company said, adding it was conducting inspections with the vendor.
The mission was initially set for late September or early October to carry three paying crew members from the Italian Air Force and the Rome-based government agency National Research Council. It makes sense that they do want to jeopardize many months and hours of hard work for it to fail.
The FAA is investigating the flight that took billionaire Richard Branson to space in July, and last week barred SpaceShipTwo flights until the agency approves the final mishap report or determines the issues do not affect public safety.
