World's largest airplane makes test flight, can deploy satellites in space

California : The world's largest airplane - a Stratolaunch behemoth with two fuselages and six Boeing 747 engines - on Saturday made a test flight in California.

The mega jet carried out its maiden voyage over the Mojave desert.

The plane has been developed in a way that it can carry into space, and drop, a rocket that can deploy a satellite then.

This will provide authorities with a more flexible way of deploying a satellite into space than making a vertical uplift.

It was built by an engineering company called Scaled Composites.

The aircraft is so big its wing span is longer than a football field, or about 1.5 times that of an Airbus A380.

On Saturday, the plane made a flight of 2 hour span.

It hit a top speed of 304 kilometers per hour (189 mph) and reached an altitude of 17,000 feet, or 5,182 meters.

“What a fantastic first flight,” said Jean Floyd, CEO of Stratolaunch.

“Today’s flight furthers our mission to provide a flexible alternative to ground launched systems,” he added.