Virgin Galactic Shares Rocket Higher: What Investors Should Know

Shares of space travel company Virgin Galactic Holdings Inc SPCE are trading higher on Thursday on news out from the company for its planned timeline of taking passengers to space.

What Happened: The next rocket-powered test flight of SpaceShip Two Unity will be conducted on May 22. The flight from Virgin Galactic will depend on the weather and technical checks.

The test flight announcement comes following the completion of the maintenance review of VMS Eve, the mothership jet aircraft that will carry the SpaceShip Two Unity to an altitude of 50,000 feet.

Watch Benzinga SPAC Attack predict this coming:

The VSS Unity flight will have two pilots and also carry research payloads for the NASA Flight Opportunities Program.

The test will include looking at items like evaluating elements of the customer cabin, testing the live-stream capability and testing the horizontal stabilizers and flight controls during the boost phase of the flight.

Related Link: Virgin Galactic Stock Loses Altitude After Q1 Earnings: What Investors Need To Know

Why It’s Important: In December, a flight from Virgin Galactic failed to reach the planned altitude. Virgin Galactic blamed a bad computer as the problem.

The failed flight pushed back the timeline for Virgin Galactic’s plan to take passengers to space.

In its first-quarter financial report, Virgin Galactic said the timeline of its test flights was being evaluated, wording that didn’t sit well with investors who sent shares down.

Virgin Galactic said part of the new flight will test lower EMI Levels from the December flight.

The test flight from Virgin Galactic comes as Blue Origin, the space company from Amazon.com Inc AMZN Founder Jeff Bezos, is auctioning off a seat for its July 20 launch to space.

See also: How to Buy Virgin Galactic (SPCE) Stock

SPCE Price Action: Shares of Virgin Galactic are up 15% to $19.77 at publication time.

Disclosure: The author is long shares of SPCE.