Richard Branson Plans Cautious Return to Space Race After Friday's Crash

By Jon Ostrower and Andy Pasztor 

Virgin Galactic founder Richard Branson sounded a cautionary tone in the wake of Friday's crash of the company's rocket-powered space plane, pledging to pursue space tourism but only after making safety improvements.

"We're not going to push on blindly," Mr. Branson vowed in his first public comments since the crash, which killed one test pilot and injured another.

SpaceShipTwo, the experimental Virgin rocket, broke apart following the ignition of its rocket engine, soon after being released from a carrier aircraft. The system is designed to eventually lift paying customers into space.

Mr. Branson reminded a news conference in Mohave, Calif., that in the early days of aviation there were major safety problems and "then aviation became very safe." In the same way, he added, "we hope that one day the test pilots will enable people to go to space safely."

The accident has left the Virgin venture reeling, and Mr. Branson said he hoped the company's work would continue. "We owe it to the test pilots to find out exactly what went wrong," he said. "If we can overcome it, we will make absolutely certain that the dream lives on."

Mr. Branson said Virgin Galactic's effort has involved "the biggest test program ever carried out" for a commercial space project "precisely to ensure this never happens to the public."

Mr. Branson said those who have reserved a place on the company's spacecraft are entitled to a refund, though he expected most of the 700 would-be space travelers putting down deposits to stick with the program. Prices range from $200,000 to $250,000 a seat. "Most of them will be patient longer," he told the news conference.

He said none of the $80 million ticket revenue collected so far had been put toward development of the spacecraft.

Mr. Branson had previously said he and his son would be on the first commercial flight as early as next year, but didn't respond to a question at Saturday's news conference asking if he had still planned on being the first.

Virgin Galactic hasn't identified the test pilots aboard the spacecraft, but Mr. Branson said they were employees of Scaled Composites, a unit of Northrop Grumman Corp., which designed SpaceShipTwo and its carrier aircraft, WhiteKnightTwo.

Subscribe to WSJ: http://online.wsj.com?mod=djnwires