Here'is a cool picture and cool article about White Knight Two the Scaled Composite's new mothership for the Virgin Galaxy space flight vehicles. It was designed to care SpaceShipTwo to an altitude of about 50000ft where it drops and then rockets up to 100km. The plane is also designed to do 4+G test flights to train astronaut tourists for Virgin Galaxy flights.

The interior is all business, and not in the business class kind of way. The cockpit is spartan, with little in the way of comfort or superfluous design. The the business of flight test and there isn’t much for pilot comfort or fancy design. The flight to Oshkosh took 5 hours and 20 minutes cruising at 350 knots (about 400 mph) true airspeed. Interestingly, when WhiteKnightTwo is flying light as it was for the trip to AirVenture, it can maintain its cruising speed with the engines at idle.

WhiteKnightTwo will carry SpaceShipTwo to an altitude of about 50,000 feet. At that point, it will release SpaceShipTwo, which will then blast off into space. The two craft have identical fuseage, which means allows WhiteKnightTwo to be used as a trainer for future astronauts. The airplane is designed to carry 27,000 pounds at the center of its wing, which makes it strong enough to endure the rigors of simulating zero gravity and the intense g forces experienced during re-entry, Rutan said.