Shares of space tourism pioneer Virgin Galactic (NYSE: SPCE) gained 2.5% through 11 a.m. ET on Monday. The company's new and improved share price appears to be benefiting from bad news for another space company entirely, however: SpaceX.

On Saturday morning, SpaceX conducted its second-ever attempt to launch a fully stacked Starship test vehicle atop a Super Heavy booster, aiming to circle the globe and crash the former into the Pacific Ocean, and pseudo-land the latter in the Gulf of Mexico. Instead, both vehicles exploded in flight.

Virgin Galactic is currently the only space tourism company carrying paying passengers on regular flights to the edge of space. Jeff Bezos's Blue Origin company has a similar vehicle capable of making the flights, but its rocket, the New Shepard, has been grounded since an unmanned version blew up midair in September 2022.

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Source Fool.com