Let loose from its White Knight mothership, the rocket engine propelling the experimental suborbital SpaceShipOne vehicle roared to life, skillfully controlled by test pilot Mike Melvill.

For others, SpaceShipOne is their generation’s first rendezvous with space exploration. On June 21, SpaceShipOne became the first privately funded manned spacecraft to reach suborbital space ...

MOJAVE DESERT, California (CNN) -- Onlookers held their breath as the manned SpaceShipOne performed unexpected but spectacular acrobatics on its way into space, the first step toward winning the ...

(SPACE.com) -- The record-setting, privately-built suborbital rocket plane -- SpaceShipOne -- is headed for a landing at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum (NASM) in Washington ...

A major turning point for private spaceflight occurred on June 21, 2004, when SpaceShipOne, the first nongovernmental crewed spacecraft, flew 62.5 miles (100 kilometers) above Earth's surface.

It has been five years since SpaceShipOne screamed its way into the history books as the first privately built and financed manned craft to reach space. While that roar from the ship's rocket ...

SpaceShipOne crossed the finish line in an 8-year, $10 million space race Monday, winning the Ansari X Prize with its second spaceflight in less than a week. Along the way, the world's first ...

SpaceShipOne's Second Flight a Success NPR's Alex Chadwick talks to Day to Day technology correspondent Xeni Jardin about the second flight of SpaceShipOne, the first commercially sponsored ...

MOJAVE, CALIFORNIA -- Human flight took a significant step forward today as the privately built SpaceShipOne flew into suborbital space for the second time in five days, securing the $10 million ...

The airplane, dubbed the White Knight, carried Mojave Aerospace Ventures' SpaceShipOne on its belly to about 14 kilometers in altitude, where the space vehicle broke off and soared to a height of ...

If you're a fan of SpaceShipOne, the world's first privately developed manned spacecraft, it's pretty hard to beat last year's act at the EAA AirVenture show in Oshkosh, Wis., when the historic ...