A piece of debris is seen near the scene of the crash of Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo near Cantil, California October 31, 2014. [Chinanews.com]

A passenger rocket plane developed by Virgin Galactic exploded Friday during a powered test flight over California, killing one of the pilots and seriously injuring the other.

Local TV footage showed debris of the spaceflight vehicle known as SpaceShipTwo scattered over a large area in Mojave desert.

"During the test, the vehicle suffered a serious anomaly resulting in the loss of the vehicle," Virgin Galactic said in a statement.

Two pilots were on board when the explosion and crash happened. After the anomaly, at least one parachute was reportedly sighted over the Mojave Air and Space Port in California, the base from which SpaceShipTwo and its carrier plane took off.

The California Highway Patrol confirmed a local media report that one person was dead and another had suffered major injuries. The survivor was flown to hospital by air ambulance.

The explosion came after the vehicle dropped away from its WhiteKnightTwo carrier airplane and fired up its hybrid rocket engine, said Stuart Witt, head of the launch base.

Nothing seemed abnormal during the takeoff, Witt told a news conference.

Despite the explosion of SpaceShipTwo, the WhiteKnightTwo carrier landed safely.

"Space is hard and today was a tough day," Virgin Galactic CEO George Whitesides told a news conference.

He said Virgin Galactic will give support to investigation. "We are going to get through it," he said.

U.S. National Transportation Safety Board investigators were on their way to the site.

SpaceShipTwo, which has been under development at Mojave Air and Space Port in a desert northeast of Los Angeles, is designed to carry two pilots and six passengers on suborbital spaceflights. Tickets to such a ride cost 250,000 U.S. dollars each.

Virgin Galactic, a British commercial spaceflight company, has been trying for years to popularize trips about 100 km above earth -- the beginning of outer space, where the tourists would be able to experience weightlessness.

The crash was the second catastrophe in the commercial space industry in a week. On Tuesday night, an unmanned rocket operated by private U.S. firm Orbital Sciences Corp. exploded seconds after its launch.

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