'Embarrassing': A cutout of Richard Branson and a model of LauncherOne. Photo / Getty Images
'Embarrassing': A cutout of Richard Branson and a model of LauncherOne. Photo / Getty Images
Virgin Galactic is "weeks away" from sending one of its rockets into space for the first time, according to founder and chairman Sir Richard Branson.
He said his space tourism firm will carry passengers beyond orbit "not too long after" that.
Sir Richard is in a race with SpaceX founder Elon Musk and Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos to be the first to send paying tourists into space.
Virgin Galactic, which is charging £190,000 ($250,000) for a spot on one of its commercial flights, has previously said it would send passengers to space in 2019.
'Doing fantastically well': Elon Musk's commercial space operation Space X has already worked on contracts for Nasa. Photo / Getty Images
But Sir Richard has a long history of underestimating the time it takes his firm to get test flights into the air, and the company has repeatedly missed his lofty targets.
The multi-millionaire admitted earlier this year that the number of spurious claims he has made about Virgin Galactic flight dates was "embarrassing".
In a new interview with news website CNBC, Sir Richard said: "We should be in space within weeks, not months.
"And then we will be in space with myself in months and not years."
"We will be in space with people not too long after that so we have got a very, very exciting couple of months ahead," he added.
Virgin Galactic, founded by Branson in 2004, is working to carry tourists on a brief journey to space, dozens of miles above the Earth's surface.
Catch up: Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo, the world's first commercial spaceline in 2014. Photo / Al Seib, Getty Images
Tourists will spend several minutes floating in zero gravity, aboard a spaceship that approaches or passes through the Karman line, the boundary of Earth's atmosphere and space, some 62 miles (100 kilometers) high.
For comparison, astronauts at the orbiting International Space Station fly some 250 miles (400 km) above Earth.
The company first promised to fly tourists into space by the start of 2009, but multiple delays and a fatal test flight crash in 2014 have pushed its first spaceflight back numerous times.
Virgin Galactic completed its first supersonic flight since the infamous crash, which killed one test pilot and severely injured another, earlier this year.
The company plans to conduct several more supersonic test flights this year.
After that, it will be closer to its goal of offering commercial spaceflight to the 600 patrons who have paid $250,000 for a ride.
Branson said "ultimately" he would like to see the price fall to around £30,000 ($40,000) or £38,000 ($50,000) over the next ten years.
Plans call for six passengers and two pilots to ride the SpaceShipTwo VSS Unity, which resembles a private jet.
The VSS Unity will be attached to a carrier spacecraft - the WhiteKnightTwo - from which it will detach at around 49,000 feet (15,000 meters.)
Blue Horizons: Amazon's CEO Jeff Bezos is not only the world's richest tech founder, but also a competitor in the new space race. Photo / Getty Images
Once released, the spaceship will fire up its rocket, and head for the sky.
Passengers will float in zero-gravity for several minutes, before coming back to Earth.
The total trip time would last between 90 minutes and two hours.
Tourism to new heights: Top altitude offered by SpaceX, Blue Horizons and Virgin Galactic
Three companies are leading the charge in commercial space travel as they race to get tourists beyond orbit.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk's firm SpaceX, Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin are all vying to be the first companies to send up the first commercial space flight.
But while Sir Richard believes Musk is "doing fantastically well" in getting cargo into space - including his own car - the real tussle is between the Virgin boss and Bezos.
Musk has reached dizzying heights with his numerous private space deliveries to the International Space Station at an altitude of around 1.4 million feet (408,000 metres), but is yet to fly any of his planned passenger-carrying craft.
Virgin Galactic reached a top altitude of 170,800 feet (52,000 metres) during a test of its VSS Unity spacecraft, which has room for six passenger and is lifted toward space on a huge carrier aricraft, on May 29.
Eventually, the company wants to fly space tourists to an altitude of 360,890 feet (110,000 metres) going beyond the 328,000 feet (100,000 metres) defined boundary of space.
Space tourist: Yusaku Maezawa was named by Space X as it's first paying customer for a service to the moon. Photo / Alessandro Di Ciommo, Getty Images
Blue Origin flew its New Shepherd spacepod, which launches aboard a traditional rocket capsule, to an altitude of 351,000 feet (107,000 metres) during a test flight near Van Horn, Texas, on April 29.
The reusable New Shepard rocket and spacecraft is intended to carry up to six space tourists, researchers and/or experiments on brief suborbital flights, the company has said.
