Return to Transcripts main page

The Lead with Jake Tapper

Virgin Galactic Spacecraft Crashes

Aired October 31, 2014 - 16:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper.

We're going to begin, of course, with the breaking news.

In the national lead, in a week where we have already witnessed one fiery setback for the civilian space program, today, another huge blow with much more serious consequences. At least one pilot has died after Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo crashed in California's Mojave Desert.

Pieces of the wreckage could be spotted from helicopters in this virtual no-man's-land. SpaceShipTwo was probably the best hope and certainly the most well-known of all the civilian space efforts, which promised to take celebrities or anyone with a quarter-million dollars to spare 60 miles high to the edge of space.

CNN aviation correspondent Rene Marsh joins us now.

Rene, what do we know about what went wrong?

RENE MARSH, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: We're still pulling in details about the -- exactly what happened. But here's what we can tell you.

As we speak, we know that NTSB, they have launched their go team.

(CROSSTALK)

TAPPER: That's the National Transportation Safety Board.

MARSH: Correct. They have a team that is headed in that direction. They will investigate.

We also know that the FAA is investigating this. As far as what happened, according to the FAA, things went wrong at around 10:00 Pacific time. That would be 1:00 our time here, where they say ground control essentially lost contact with SpaceShipTwo.

We should remind folks at home that this is an experimental flight vehicle. On board were two pilots. We do have the unfortunate news that one of the two people on board did not survive this.

A little bit more about this vehicle. It's intended, as you mentioned off the top, the big picture here is to eventually take people who want to go and who can afford to go to space.

TAPPER: Space tourism, it's called.

MARSH: Exactly. And this specific vehicle could fit about six passengers and two pilots. Of course, that was not the case because we know this was a test flight that was under way when things went wrong here.

Again, what exactly caused this to happen, we do not know. That is why we have these two teams, NTSB and the FAA, going there to investigate. We do know that whatever happened here is sure to delay this space tourism, as you say, where you essentially have regular people who want to go up there.

They're going to need to push that back a bit while they look into exactly how this all happened. Of course, the plan was about -- for more than $250,000, you can take this flight up to the edge of space. Of course, now the key here is for investigators to figure out what exactly went wrong, Jake.

TAPPER: And, Rene, you mentioned that one of the two test pilots was killed. What do we know about the other test pilot?

MARSH: We know the other one is seriously injured. Don't know details specifically about what kind of injuries this person sustained. However, we did see video of a medical helicopter.

So one could presume that that is the individual who was airlifted to the closest hospital there, but don't have specifics on that individual's injuries at this point.

TAPPER: Now, the Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo is what's called a rocket plane. It's not just an airplane. It's built with the kind of rocket that takes normal ships up to space, although obviously it doesn't have to reach as far as the space shuttle does.

What more do we know about the rocket plane?

MARSH: We do know that roughly or nearly $500 million to develop this. And we saw that Virgin Galactic, they did tweet out earlier today that SpaceShipTwo is a total loss.

So let's bring folks up to speed of exactly the two components here that we're talking about. You have two pieces to this, which is SpaceShipTwo. We know that that is the vehicle that was a total loss. But, however, this vehicle is carried on top of another vehicle. It is known as WhiteKnightTwo. The acronym for it is WK2.

That vehicle carries the rocket. That vehicle landed safely, no problems. It is SpaceShipTwo which the two pilots were on board. That is the one where we saw this issue where we now know something went terribly wrong and it came to a catastrophic end there, and one dead and one injured.

TAPPER: Let's bring in Stephanie Elam, who is in the CNN Los Angeles bureau, obviously, the Mojave Desert just north of Los Angeles.

Stephanie, the reaction out there where Virgin Galactic is part of local industry and obviously people who work on this project, on Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo live, tell us what you know.

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jake, it's the idea of hope. Right? You're building hope. You're building a dream that is going on out there in the desert, in the Mojave Desert.

And the high desert is -- it's very vast, it's very open, as you can see from these images on the screen right now. This is where you can do all of this kind of work without the interference of other flying objects generally, of buildings, of a lot of people on the ground.

But still the major focus right now is the loss of life here. And from what I can gather, the space community is very small, very tight- knit, and so there's devastation around the fact that one of theirs has been lost and that this other person is so seriously injured, and that the debris field is as wide as appears to be.

We understand that there may be three different areas that they're working from here as they were doing this test flight and where the crash site came down, as you can see from these shots right here. A lot of work is going to have to go into piecing this together to figure out exactly what went wrong and how they move forward from here.

The whole idea of building the space rocket, the idea that it would allow people to become sort of -- take a casual jaunt into space, almost, for just the average person, obviously, like you said, $250,000 of that, but, still, it would take up -- the idea here being to take up six people at a time, along with two pilots.

The vehicle the pilots were in, that would let go of this rocket and then allow those six passengers to have that six minutes of just being weightless, of seeing what it's like in space. And then they would get back in their chairs and then they would glide back down to Earth. That's the idea behind it, so not the longest journey, but still allowing people to see what something's like that they would normally not be able to do unless they were an actual or real astronaut.

TAPPER: Stephanie Elam in Los Angeles.

If you're just joining in, let me bring you up to speed. Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo at about 1:00 p.m. Eastern, 10:00 a.m. Pacific crashed in the Mojave Desert. It's a total loss of a $500 million vehicle. We're told that the pilot -- one of the two test pilots, one of them is dead. The other one is seriously injured.

I want to bring in now Leroy Chiao. He's a former astronaut. He's flown in four different missions.

Leroy, thanks for joining us.

What do you make of this?

LEROY CHIAO, FORMER NASA ASTRONAUT: Well, obviously, this is a major incident. It's a significant step -- setback for Virgin Galactic. For the commercial space flight industry, it's not as big a setback. But any time you have an anomaly, it's going to affect everyone. And the fact that we have had now two anomalies, with the failure of

the Antares rocket earlier in the week, it's not been a good week.

TAPPER: Yes, let's talk about that, if you would, Leroy, the idea that there was this crash Tuesday evening off the coast of Virginia, the Wallops Island orbital Antares, that unmanned rocket ship that was supposed to bring supplies to astronauts on the International Space Station.

That crashed. That of course was a total loss as well. This seems like a devastating week for the commercial space program.

CHIAO: Yes, you're right.

And the fact that both occurred this week, unrelated, but just unfortunately they both did occur this week. But the Antares loss, that was a known rocket engine that had been used for a long time. This one is a development program, the Virgin vehicle. SpaceShipTwo is a development vehicle using a relatively new propulsion system, also a development, piece of engineering development project, so very different things, very different circumstances.

And, unfortunately, in this case, there appears to have been a fatality.

TAPPER: Richard Branson, obviously the owner of Virgin Galactic, he recently told CNN that he believed Virgin Galactic was in the final stages of getting approval from the FAA for its space tourism program. How much do you think that that is still a possibility?

It seems like that would be a nonstarter at this point, at least in the short to immediate future.

CHIAO: Well, it's not that they would never get approval. That process is going to be pushed back now. Obviously, there will be a full accident investigation to determine the root cause of the accident, find the lessons -- apply the lessons learned.

And so the certification process will be pushed down the road. There's no question about that. But I'm confident that if they stay with it, they will get certification and it will be a successful program. But obviously after a major incident like this, it's going to be -- there's going to be a delay.

TAPPER: Leroy, do you think there's enough oversight of the commercial space ventures that we're seeing? These are attempts by private industry to put people into space. We have seen two horrific incidents, one of them with at least one loss of life. Is there enough supervision?

CHIAO: Oh, absolutely there's enough supervision.

In the case of commercial space launches involving NASA, you have got both FAA and NASA looking over the shoulders and being an active part in certification. In the case of Virgin Galactic, it's all FAA, since NASA's not involved in that program. But you can bet that just as the FAA is very responsible in looking over airline operations, they're going to apply the same standards to space operations.

TAPPER: What effect do you think these crashes will have on the future of space tourism? It sounds like you don't think it's anything in the long term, although you acknowledge that the FAA will obviously push back any approval for the Virgin Galactic program, at least in the short-term.

CHIAO: Yes, that's right.

In the long term, I don't think there will be a big effect. During any development program, as we discussed earlier, you're going to -- unfortunately, you're incurring higher risks. That's why you have test programs like SpaceShipTwo is going through. And, unfortunately, during the test phase, just like testing high-performance aircraft for the military, there are incidents and mishaps like this, too.

TAPPER: All right, Leroy Chiao, stay with us. Don't go anywhere.

We're going to take a very quick break. When we come back, we're going to have more coverage of this tragic crash of the Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo in the Mojave Desert right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper.

We are following some tragic breaking news: Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo has crashed in the desert in Mojave, California. Something went terribly wrong during one of its test flights. We're told at least one of the two test pilots is dead. The other seriously injured.

Let's go right now to Joel Glenn Brenner. She's a former "Washington Post" reporter who knew both pilots, knows one of the pilots and knew the other pilot, and knows the Virgin Galactic program inside-out.

First of all, Joel, and thank you for being with us. I'm so sorry about the loss of your friend.

JOEL GLENN BRENNER, FORMER WASHINGTON POST REPORTER (via telephone): I am, too. These guys were both -- they're both amazing pilots and people. We're not talking about exactly who they are. The families have still -- I don't know if they've been notified. And it's still unclear to me and everyone else, I think, outside of the immediate people who are there in rescue operations as to who managed to parachute out on the way down and who did not.

One of the pilots miraculously did manage to scramble out of the debris and deploy his parachute, which I found that incredible to hear. And he still apparently suffered great injury. But he is alive and we can only hope and pray that he makes it. And the other pilot was not so fortunate because the plane -- excuse me, the spaceship broke up at 50,000 feet. So, you know, you can only imagine the distance traveling back down to earth. And they had no time at all to react really to what happened. It blew up within the first six seconds of ignition. And obviously it

gives you very, very little time to react. So, my guess is that whoever it was that managed to deploy the parachute really managed to do that on the way down, managed to escape the debris on the way down and then deploy his parachute.

TAPPER: Joel, obviously we're not naming either of the pilots right now because we're not sure if the next of kin have been notified and we want to respect that process. But if you would and after this question, we'll turn to the SpaceShipTwo program in general. But if you would, if you could tell us a little bit about the characters of these two test pilots, who they were in terms of their character, why they did this.

BRENNER: Of course. Well, first of all, they were both incredibly dedicated. They both worked on the SpaceShipOne program, which was the predecessor to the Virgin Galactic program. And SpaceShipOne was the spaceship that many my recall was the Ansari $10 million X prize back in 2004 and was credited really with opening the floodgates to this whole idea of space tourism and opening space for the rest of us. When Paul Allen, the co-founder of Microsoft, teamed up with Burt Rutan and Paul funded the development of the very first privately developed and privately run space program, which was a truly miraculous and wonderful thing that we all watched.

And one of these pilots was also a pilot in the SpaceShipOne program. The other pilot at that time was also a test pilot for the company, Scaled Composite, which build both spaceships, both SpaceShipOne and SpaceShipTwo. And they were both -- they were actually -- in fact, they were very, very good friends, the two of them.

And they were some of the talented flight pilots I've ever seen. For two young gentlemen, they had talents like you would not believe. They were both civilian pilots. In other words, neither one of them had gone through military training to achieve their skills.

They sort of were both born into flight. And they loved to fly. Flying was the passion. Flying was what they lived to do. And absolutely they both understood the risks that they took in this job which is, as a test pilot, the most scary job, I think, anyone could undertake, which is to get into a vehicle that's never been tried before by any human being and take it up for the very first time and see that, you know, she's flight-worthy.

TAPPER: Unbelievable, yes.

BRENNER: The men who do that are incredible people. And these two gentlemen were certainly of that nature.

TAPPER: We're looking at some live footage from Mojave, California, from "Reuters" of the debris field from this Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo rocket plane crash.

Joel, stay with us, if you would. I'm going to turn to Richard Quest for one second. Richard Quest, we're told that the National Transportation Safety Board is dispatching a go team to try to piece together the scattered wreckage and get to the bottom of exactly how this happened.

Richard, you know Richard Branson, the founder of Virgin Galactic. You've interviewed him. He just tweeted, "Thoughts with all of Virgin Galactic and Scaled, thank you for all your messages of support. I'm flying to Mojave immediately to be with the team."

Richard, tell us if you would about Richard Branson and how much of a setback that could cause him. As you and I have discussed before, this is somebody who has undertaken very risky ventures before, lost friends to those ventures before, lost employees to those ventures before and while it has obviously upset him, it does not deter him.

RICHARD QUEST, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: Not at all. Whether it's in the commercial sphere launching the virgin record group and then Virgin Atlantic, the airline, or indeed in his own personal extreme endeavors trying to balloon around the world, two of his efforts ended -- one in the ocean -- well, both in the ocean, actually, as they were going across the world. And then the death of one of the people he flew with, Steven Fossett. He's been extremely friendly and well known with Burt Rutan, the man who designed SpaceShipOne and was very much involved with SpaceShipTwo.

And then, of course, you go back to 1986 when Richard Branson on a speedboat crossed the Atlantic to win the blue ribbon.

So, I'm trying to give you a picture of not a swashbuckling buccaneer, somebody who takes unnecessary risks. Somebody who does his research very carefully, has great resources to put into the project, who will look at this from every possible view and then decides to take the risk and proceed. It's in that vein that virgin galactic was conceived, was executed but it was not some cowboy operation, or at least the investigators will now look into what went wrong here.

And finally, Jake, just to point out here, he's very much the sort of man who will mourn the loss but still believe the ambition and goal is worth the price.

TAPPER: Richard, as an expert in aviation, I want to talk to you about something that Joel Brenner was just talking to us about, about the bravery of these pilots. Obviously, the space program which began in earnest in the early '60s began with the death of a couple of cosmonauts in Russia. Then in 1967, there was that tragic incident in the United States that ended the lives of three U.S. Air Force astronauts, White, Chaffee and Gus Grissom, of course. The kinds of people who do this work, the spirit that they have and the bravery that they have is just remarkable, and I know that you have spoken to a number of test pilots over your long career covering aviation.

What drives them to do this?

QUEST: What drives them is the goal to get the job done. It's crucial to understand, these men and women who are test pilots are not some foolish risk-takers determined to push things as far as possible until death do they part. That is not what being a test pilot is about.

I've interviewed many of them, civil aviation, A380, all these planes that they have to put up for the first time, and you say to them, they've got a steely look about them. They're usually military or former military. They have a look about them.

They say, by the time we do it, we have a very good idea of what we are doing. And it's a calculated risk. And that's the key to understand about these men and women, they are not some foolhardies going off into the wild blue yonder. They know there's a risk to be taken, but they have to take the risk if we are advanced.

TAPPER: Richard Quest, stay with us, if you will.

Earlier this month, Richard Branson, the CEO and founder of Virgin Galactic, spoke with our own Poppy Harlow about the risks of space travel. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RICHARD BRANSON, VIRGIN GALACTIC FOUNDER & CEO: We're beginning the final stages of test flights in-flight. By the end of this year, we will actually have gone into space.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The FAA has signed off on you doing these test flights which are in the midst of. But what about the final sign-off?

BRANSON: It's a process that's been gone through the for the last two or three years.

HARLOW: Because they've never done it before. This is a first for them as well.

BRANSON: Absolutely. It's a fascinating process for everybody involved. I'm not going to take my son into space until I'm absolutely sure that we've got everything right. And the team won't let me go into space until they're sure we have everything right. And we feel very confident that things are on the right track and that we should get FAA approval early next year.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)