Will Virgin Galactic Operate Out of Puerto Rico?
Airport at the former Roosevelt Roads naval base.
UPDATE: Virgin Galactic has denied the report.
Reports have surfaced that Virgin Galactic is looking to operate out of a decommissioned U.S. Navy facility named Roosevelt Roads in Puerto Rico. The base could host both suborbital space tourism flight, but it would also be ideal for launching small satellites.
Caribbean Business reports that Sir Richard Branson’s company has purchased 11 hangars at the former base, which is run today as the José Aponte de la Torre Airport. The general aviation airport has an 11,000-foot long runway.
However, another report by Agencia EFE says that no deal has been reached.
The secretary of the Economic Development and Trade Department of Puerto Rico, Alberto Bacó Bagué, denied to Efe on Friday that any deal had been closed with the British multimillionaire’s company, while representatives of Virgin Galactic also refused to confirm the rumors.
The airport would provide Virgin Galactic with the ability to fly space tourists above the Caribbean. It would also provide the capability to launch small satellites over the ocean using the LauncherOne rocket the company is developing.
Virgin Galactic’s rival, SXC, is planning to launch suborbital space tourism flights from the Caribbean island of Curacao. The company will be flying XCOR’s two-person Lynx space plane, which is now under development in Mojave, Calif.
Operating out of Puerto Rico also would bring tax benefits.
Branson also is among the high-net-worth individuals Economic Development & Commerce Development Secretary Alberto Bacó Bagué has been wooing to the island under Law 22 tax benefits that eliminate all taxes on any passive income they receive after they relocate here.
“We are initiating conversations with Sir Richard Branson because a strong connection with London is essential to what we are trying to do with insurance,” Bacó said in December, pointing to Puerto Rico’s effort to become an international insurance center.
The U.S. Navy used the Roosevelt Roads base from 1957 to 2003, when it was decommissioned. The airfield was converted into a general purpose airport.
SpaceX had considered the naval base as a possible location for a commercial spaceport for its Falcon launch vehicles. However, the company is leaning toward constructing the facility south of Brownsville, Texas.
UPDATE: It also occurred to me that Puerto Rico is not too far from Branson’s private Necker Island retreat in the British Virgin Islands. It probably wouldn’t be too difficult to offer vacation packages that included a stay on Necker Island with several days in Puerto Rico for training and a flight to space.
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Zing! Parabolic snark!
I agree. They need to focus on getting it going.
What? There was no hidden message in there.
It was thought that VG and Branson had already signed an agreement with Spaceport America in New Mexico to fly all of their flights out of there, so how would it work for VG to just fly out of Puerto Rico or Abu Dhabi where they have been building a spaceport, plus they have some kind of a deal to fly out of Sweden that has not been fully explained. New Mexico taxpayers have spent more than $220 million building the special use facility there designed by and for VG, they even extended the runway another 2000 feet at NM expense even though the runway was designed and signed off on by VG at a cost of another million or so. With all the double talk going on from the Board at Spaceport America it still is not clear if VG has ever taken control of the terminal facility and has started paying rent and done the tenant improvements to the facility which is called for in the lease and represented to be an expenditure of $10 million. No one I know that will talk will answer any real questions in New Mexico. There has just always been a lot of distance between the cup and the lip down there.
Interesting points.