to space. rachel crane has more. reporter: the countdown is on. in just hours entrepreneur richard branson hopes to become the first person to ride a self funded rocket into suborbital space. astronaut, zero zero 1, richard branson. a launch two decades in the making. tell me, how do you feel. i managed to avoid getting excited for 17 years since we started building space ships and mother ships and space ports and all these things. i finally got the call from the chief engineer saying every box had been tick the on the safety aspect and would i like to go to space? and i hit i hit the roof. i was to excited. the virgin galactic rocket powered space plane is set to take oev tomorrow from new mexico. the mother ship will release the is a spaceship at 40,000 feet.