Branson’s Booby

Surprise, surprise! The Virgin Galactic sub-orbital space flight has been delayed again … see: Bloomberg Article. Richard Branson, President of Virgin Enterprises, has just announced that the first passenger-carrying flight of his Buck Rogers adventure will be delayed again … until next spring. This is the umpteenth cancellation of this event which was last scheduled for this past August … see: Space Shot. Tom Bower who is writing a book about this British entrepreneur opines (in the first article referenced above) that Branson’s booby (my term … that sea-bird which is notorious for having difficulty taking off) is “unlikely ever to attain its goal of carrying passengers into sub-orbital flight.”

So far this adventure has already collected more than $80 million in deposits (@ $250,000 a pop) from would-be passengers (many famous … see the above article.) Although I have been picking on Richard Branson ... in a way this would be a shame … for such a “failure to launch” would clearly sully what has been Branson’s otherwise larger-than-life life.