The commercial space ship that promised to fly hundreds of passengers beyond Earth's atmosphere as early as next year has crash landed.
Virgin Galatic reported its SpaceShipTwo experienced an "in-flight anamoly" at 1:13 p.m. ET via Twitter. One pilot aboard died in the crash and another was injured, according to NBC News. They both were equipped with parachutes and both were deployed.
Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo launched at 12:19 p.m. ET from Mojave Air and Space Port in Mojave, California. The ship lifted off connected to another aircraft called WhiteKnightTwo and they stayed together until they reached 50,000 feet. WhiteKnightTwo then released SpaceShipTwo at 1:07 p.m. ET.
Virgin Galactic reported the anomaly six minutes later. Space blogger Doug Messier witnessed the SpaceShipTwo "blow up" and come down "in pieces." He also saw a body still in its seat at one of the debris sites.
The spaceflight company released a statement at 2:30 p.m ET.
"Virgin Galactic's partner Scaled Composites conducted a powered test flight of SpaceShipTwo earlier today. During the test, the vehicle suffered a serious anomaly resulting in the loss of the vehicle. The WhiteKnightTwo carrier aircraft landed safely... We will work closely with relevant authorities to determine the cause of this accident and provide updates as soon as we are able to do so."
The FAA released a statement saying it has started an investigation and the Mojave Air and Spaceport will hold a press briefing at 5 p.m. E.T.
The Kern County Fire Department responded to the crash site located north of Mojave, according to NASA Watch. The emergency crew located the one survivor with moderate neck and back injuries, according to NASA Watch. A helicopter secured the pilot and airlifted him to Antelope Valley Hospital located in Lancaster, California.
"We hope that the survivor will be just fine," Kern County Sherriff Donny Youngblood said at news briefing.
More helicopters continue to fly over the area searching for debris.
SpaceShipTwo test flight was delayed a few hours due to windy weather conditions. Virgin Galactic promoted the event on Twitter as a "Halloween treat."
Virgin Galactic introduced SpaceShipTwo on Dec. 7, 2009. Virgin founder Richard Branson has booked a ticket for the first commercial space flight, tentatively planned to launch in February or March of 2015, according to Mashable.
More than 700 passengers have paid as much as $250,000 to travel the Earth's edge for the suborbital flight, according to NBC News. A distance to an outer-space altitude is defined as 100 kilometers or 62 miles.
Virgin still plans to take flight soon with those who paid for the experience, according to Virgin Galactic's CEO George T. Whitesides.
"Space is hard, and today was a tough day," Whitesides told reporters. "We are going to be supporting the investigation as we figure out what happened today, and we're going to get through it. The future rests in many ways on hard, hard days like this. But we believe we owe it to the folks who were flying these vehicles as well as the folks who are working so hard on them to understand this and to move forward."
