Virgin Galactic crash: Pilot who survived alert, talking to family, doctors

The pilot who survived the Virgin Galactic spacecraft crash in California desert is "alert in hospital and talking with his family and doctors," a report said.

The 43-year-old pilot, Peter Siebold, was steering the SpaceShipTwo craft along with Mike Alsbury when it went down over the Mojave Desert on Friday. Alsbury, a father of two, was killed in the accident, reported The Mirror.

The Virgin Galactic space tourism craft came down after suffering "a serious anomaly" during its 35th test flight.

Hundreds of people had already reserved seats and paid a deposit of 2,50,000 dollars for a minutes-long sub-orbital flight on SpaceShipTwo. The spacecraft can carry six passengers.

Virgin had hoped to launch commercially in 2015.