Many questions still unanswered in spaceship crash

LOS ANGELES » Federal accident investigators have an early sense of what went wrong before an experimental spaceship designed to ferry tourists beyond the Earth’s atmosphere broke apart during a test flight. But they still don’t know why the craft prematurely shifted its shape prior to the deadly crash.

And another question looms: How far will the accident push back the day when paying customers can routinely rocket dozens of miles into the sky for a fleeting feel of weightlessness and a breathtaking view?

A team from the National Transportation Safety Board kept working Monday at the Mojave Desert crash site where Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo fell to the ground. The accident killed the co-pilot and badly injured the pilot who parachuted out of the ship Friday.

Late Sunday, acting NTSB Chairman Christopher Hart said cockpit video showed that the co-pilot unlocked SpaceShipTwo’s unique “feathering” system earlier than planned.