This plane is a Virgin Galactic White Knight Two. A White Knight Two plane was reportedly accompanying the SpaceShipTwo today and has landed safely.
  • Jeff Schultes / Shutterstock.com
  • This plane is a Virgin Galactic White Knight Two. A White Knight Two plane was reportedly accompanying the SpaceShipTwo today and has landed safely.

Not much information is available on this story at the moment. Virgin Galactic has released a statement saying that SpaceShipTwo "suffered a serious anomaly resulting in the loss of the vehicle" and that the status of the pilots "is unknown at this time." Breaking News has created a timeline on the crash and is updating it regularly. SpaceShipTwo is the latest model in Virgin Galactic's space tourism program. Here's a promotional video from earlier this year showing SpaceShipTwo in action:

This has been a very bad week for space travel.

UPDATE 11:55 PM: The AP is reporting that the California Highway Patrol says there was one fatality and one "major injury" in the crash.