Jaunted - Tag: space tourism

Hey, Who Wants to Go to Space in a Giant Hot Air Balloon?

Omri — 2011-08-29T15:39:55-05:00

As part of our ongoing effort to track space tourism competition—because how else is the price ever going to drop enough so we can afford it—please turn your attention to the bloon.

Designed by Spanish entrepreneur Jose Lopez-Urdiales, the bloon is a sub-orbital device (kind of) that takes people to space (in a manner of speaking) and is scheduled to start flying in 2013 (theoretically). We're hedging on this description because the bloon isn't so much a spaceship like we've all become used to, as much as it is a really big hot air balloon.

The project webpage is reasonably slick, though the branding is kind of gratingly New Agey. There's lots of hand waving about going to "a place where borders do not really exist" and "where creation becomes real," with a promise to "help awaken consciousness of the unique, fragile beauty of our planet" so that you can become "one with your home planet." If we didn't know better we'd think it was kind of a parody, but other parts of the site seem reasonably straightforward.

NASA Hires Virgin Galactic to Cover All That Space Flying Stuff

Omri — 2011-08-15T15:34:05-05:00

The United States doesn't really have a space travel program any more, inasmuch as our leaders found better and more inspirational programs to fund than ones that have astronauts literally reaching for the stars (e.g. empty rural airports in the home states of powerful Senators).

The problem is that NASA still has engineers and scientists who need to run experiments in low-gravity and no-gravity conditions, and they'd kind of like to keep doing some of those. So agency officials looked around, scratched their collective heads, and checked if there was still anyone still doing that space flight thing.

And that's the short version of how Virgin Galactic became NASA's official sub-contracter. The press release is here, and if you click through make sure you at least read the bolded quote in the middle of the release. It's the longest string of words that mean the least that you'll ever encounter.

Seattle: Seattle's Space Needle Wants to Send You to...Umm...Space

Omri — 2011-08-08T15:19:38-05:00

We've spent the last few years tracking how private space tourism is becoming a capital-T Thing—and of course now that the space shuttle program is dead, private space flight is for better or worse the only game in town.

You might also remember a post from last year about commercial space travel company Space Adventures, which inked a deal with Boeing for vehicles that could be shot into low-earth orbit. We speculated at the time that the world was still many years from regular launches, both because it takes time to build spaceships and because we still don't really have the infrastructure to launch them.

All of that aside, we're certainly getting closer. There are now contests springing up promising to send lucky winners into space, with the latest coming from the team behind the Seattle Space Needle. The iconic tourist attraction was built for the 1962 World's Fair and, as its 50th anniversary celebration approaches, organizers want to recapture some of that futuristic magic.

Space Tourism Six Years From Now to Be Kind of Affordable

Omri — 2011-05-09T13:47:14-05:00

Obviously "affordable" is a relative concept when it comes to space tourism. But we've been telling you for a while to keep your fingers crossed for competition between Virgin Galactic and potential rivals, if only because that way we can all dream about one day maybe flying in a sub-orbital. Prices aren't going to drop in the next few years for a bunch of reasons, from the fact that Virgin Galactic is the only company building a spaceport—which kind of puts a damper on competition—to the simple high costs of flying people into space.

Even at this early stage, though, serious people are beginning to envision how space tourism might become more available to more people. Virgin Galactic's former President Will Whitehorn just gave a far-reaching talk on the topic, and he predicted that ticket prices would drop from their current price of $200,000 to below $100,000.

Let's Talk Space Tourism. What's Virgin Galactic Been Up To Lately?

Omri — 2011-04-25T17:02:05-05:00

Six months after its first solo flight—coverage and background here and here—the Virgin Galactic VSS Enterprise passed another milestone last Friday. The sub-orbital spaceship set a new 14:30 minute record after being dropped by its mothership, gliding over the Mohave Desert while test pilots confirmed that everything was working. This was the spaceship's fifth release, and things continue to progress nicely.

Eventually tests will start to incorporate the craft's space-age hybrid rocket motor, which thus far has only been tested on the ground. Those trials are going to begin over the next few months, with 2012 still the target for when commercial space tourism becomes a reality. By then the New Mexico Spaceport America, being built for both vertical and horizontal takeoffs, will also be ready.

Foursquare Goes Where No Man Has Gone Before With An Extraterrestrial Check In

juliab — 2010-10-25T11:30:08-05:00

We’re pretty sure this is the coolest Foursquare badge and check in that you can get – on Friday, NASA astronaut Douglas H Wheelock used it to check in to space. Who knew cellphones worked up there?

He checked in at the International Space Station and, according to Foursquare, became the first human to “use a location-based service from space.” Now there’s something to tell the grandkids.

While he was up there, he also unlocked the new NASA Explorer badge, which will surely become the ultimate Foursquare badge to get. And the good news is that you don’t have to be up in the air to get it – soon, you’ll be able to unlock it when you check in at NASA properties on terra firma. Awesome! That's $200,000 saved right there.

Richard Branson On Hand To Open Spaceport America's First Runway

Omri — 2010-10-25T09:05:08-05:00

A spaceship that can fly on its own needs a runway for takeoffs and landings, and so Virgin Galactic now has one of those too. The company's head honcho Richard Branson was joined last Friday by Governor Bill Richardson to formally inaugurate the much-anticipated runway of the much-anticipated spaceport in the New Mexico desert. That would be the much-anticipated commercial spaceport, built specifically to shuttle space tourists back and forth.

We're not quite there yet, because the VSS Enterprise - having completed that drop flight two weeks ago - still needs to undergo further work. Rocket testing has to be done, and nobody's actually flown the thing into space yet. But with updates now coming every month and half a month, it's not hard to squint into the future and see a time when space tourism actually becomes a capital-t Thing. The official estimate is 9 months to 18 months, give or take a few.