The expenses associated with inter space travel have deterred private industries from developing their own private spaceships in the past. However with the “Final Frontier” now being opened up to space tourism, the private industry is getting involved in space travel as well. Recently a commercial passenger space liner has been on test flights using its rocket power.

The private spaceship reached supersonic speeds in its ten minute test ride. The test was conducted on the SpaceShipTwo or SS2 by teams from Scaled Composites and Virgin Galactic. It also marked the entrance into the final stage of vehicle testing before beginning commercial service from Spaceport America in New Mexico.

Virgin Galactic founder Richard Branson said that the first flight of the Virgin Spaceship Enterprise was without any doubt their most important test flight till date. He added that for the first time they were able to prove key components of the system, fully integrated and in flight.

The craft reached an altitude of 47,000 feet in WK2 after which the SS2 was released and propelled to 55,000 feet in an engine burn of 16 seconds. The SS2 reached Mach 1.2 speed. The next few months will see intense research in this science project as the company prepares the SS2 for a full space flight by the end of 2013.