Spacecraft for tourists breaks up on test flight

A winged spaceship designed to take tourists on excursions beyond Earth’s atmosphere broke up during a test flight Friday over the Mojave Desert, killing a pilot in the second fiery setback for commercial space travel in less than a week.

Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo blew apart after being released from a carrier aircraft at high altitude, said Ken Brown, a photographer who witnessed the accident.

One pilot was found dead inside the spacecraft and another parachuted out and was flown by helicopter to a hospital, Kern County Sheriff Donny Youngblood said.