Why Wannabe Astronauts Shouldn't Get Too Excited About Virgin Galactic’s Flight to 'Space'

For the first time in a very long time, Sir Richard Branson has some good news to report from the spaceport he built in the Mojave desert: at 7:11 a.m. Pacific time Thursday, his Virgin Galactic company at last succeeded in launching honest-to-goodness astronauts into honest-to-goodness space. Sort of. Maybe. If you're grading on a really, really generous curve. But that's not the breathless way the news is being framed.

For the first time in a very long time, Sir Richard Branson has some good news to report from the spaceport he built in the Mojave desert: at 7:11 a.m. Pacific time Thursday, his Virgin Galactic company at last succeeded in launching honest-to-goodness astronauts into honest-to-goodness space. Sort of. Maybe. If you're grading on a really, really generous curve. But that's not the breathless way the news is being framed.