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Space travel may still be the stuff of science fiction to the average Earthling, but in 2000, popular science The story has been published Contributor Dan Clay predicts that such luxury vacations could be available as early as 2007. To get space travel into orbit, a lot had to go right, especially in such a short period of time. Almost a quarter of a century later, we’ve made some progress, but 2007 was a very optimistic year even for the super-wealthy.
The hype and excitement started about 10 years ago in 1990. Toyohiro Akiyama He became the first civilian to travel to space. The eight-day mission, named Mir CosmoReporter, transported Akiyama to the Mir space station on a Soviet Soyuz rocket. Akiyama’s ticket was financed by Tokyo Broadcasting System (TBS), which paid an undisclosed amount, likely more than $12 million, to the Soviet Union. Although Akiyama’s nightly broadcasts during his stay did not necessarily have glowing reviews regarding space travel, TBS was initially successful in increasing ratings and ratings. In December 1990, new york times This is how he called the anti-hero of the Akiyama universe. Mr. Akiyama spent a lot of time [during nightly broadcasts] It explains the ugly details of space sickness. A chain smoker, he asked for a cigarette many times. He complained that his brain felt as if it were “floating in my head.” I was told to pack light, but I didn’t bring enough underwear. ”
2001, a few months after the Clay incident. popular science Article, US Venture Capitalist Dennis TitoHe worked for NASA early in his career and becomes the second civilian to escape Earth’s gravitational pull. America’s first space traveler. The price tag is $20 million.
If Akiyama’s week as an astronaut ignited the fuse for space tourism by demonstrating that civilians could travel to space, it was Tito’s hopes for the trip that provided the oxygen a decade later. It was. “Space enthusiasts say the resulting publicity will spark interest from investment capitalists,” Clay wrote, referring to Tito’s upcoming space odyssey. At the time, more than half a dozen space tourism companies and organizations that had sprung up in the 1990s were already predicting a rosy trajectory for business over the next decade, despite having no track record of sending objects or people into space. .
Some space travel enthusiasts, such as Buzz Aldrin, the famous American astronaut who followed Neil Armstrong to the moon’s surface in July 1969, have worked hard to develop an affordable means of getting into space. Some people put effort into it. Aldrin founded ShareSpace in 1998 to promote space travel as something for everyone, not just the super-rich. he also starcraft booster In 1996, he designed a reusable booster rocket and developed the basic hardware for NASA.
Jeffrey Manber – An entrepreneur still working on the front lines of space missions, currently voyager space— served as CEO of MirCorp. MirCorp was a private joint venture established between the United States and Russia in the 1990s to commercialize access to Russia’s Mir space station, which was deorbited in 2001.
Other enthusiasts focused on hospitality. Robert Bigelow, founder of the terrestrial Budget Suites hotel chain, has set his sights on the development of an inflatable space habitat, and has invested deep pockets. bigelow aerospace Space Island Group was established in 1999. Gene Myers In the mid-1990s, he developed a plan to turn America’s used space shuttle fuel tanks into habitats. Designers at Space Island Group proposed leaving empty 747-sized shuttle fuel tanks in orbit so they could be converted into living quarters.
Vacations in space come with unique logistical challenges, so the Virginia-based space adventurewas founded in 1998, recognizing that wealthy civilians needed help coordinating travel, negotiating with space agencies, preparing for zero-gravity vacations, and more. In 1996, Space Tourism Association sought to create a community of like-minded enthusiasts to share resources, attend conferences, and attract sponsors.
With a few exceptions, such as Space Adventures and the Space Tourism Society, most of the companies and organizations founded in the 1990s to pursue space tourism have either disappeared or changed their mission to something less ambitious. I did. ShareSpace currently provides educational resources for school children, and Bigelow Aerospace has been inactive since 2019. But in their wake, a slew of new companies are filling the space travel void. The new generation, mostly founded by billionaires and international aerospace companies, has far more money and resources than their predecessors, making space travel a reality, at least for space yacht billionaires. Looks like it’s much more likely.
Over the past two decades, rocket launch companies have been established around the world, and since 2000, the number of orbital launches, primarily for the purpose of placing satellites, has tripled. space x Recently, it was in the news for returning a large booster to its launch pad. Reusable rockets were a prerequisite for the affordability of space travel cited by 1990s experts like Aldrin.
In 2024, Earthlings also witnessed the first commercial spacewalk by a civilian, billionaire Jared Isaacman. But his sensational debut didn’t exactly bode well for the budding space tourism industry. According to some estimates, Isaacman paid an astronomical $200 million The privilege of walking in space doesn’t come at a price that will stimulate demand even for the super-wealthy.
Currently, space tourism companies are classified as orbital or suborbital. In a suborbital trip like the one offered by virgin galacticfounded by Sir Richard Branson in 2004, blue originJeff Bezos’ aerospace company’s spacecraft will travel to where space begins and Earth’s atmosphere ends, about 60 miles above sea level. Because the spacecraft never enters a stable orbit and must travel an additional 40 miles to enter low-Earth orbit, the trip will be short, taking just a few hours round trip. Still, passengers will be able to see the Earth clearly and experience several minutes of weightlessness.
As the name suggests, orbital space travel involves placing passengers into orbit. As of September 2024, SpaceX has launched. 5 commercial flightsdelivering civilians for short stays on the International Space Station or in low Earth orbit. It was SpaceX’s Polaris Dawn mission that enabled Isaacman to become the first civilian to walk in space. Space Adventures is one of the few remaining space tourism companies from the 1990s and has driven several commercial flights connecting customers with orbital missions, primarily in the Russian spaceflight program Roscosmos. Ta.
Space travel today is as full of grand visions and ideas as it was a quarter-century ago. For example, Blue Origin orbital leafIt is a commercial, mixed-use destination for “commerce, research, tourism, and more,” according to its website. Space Adventures is already pushing for a lunar orbit mission, saying it will “take you to within hundreds of kilometers of the moon’s surface.” they advertise. “You’ll see the illuminated far side of the moon and witness the astonishing sight of the Earth rising above the moon’s surface.” What’s your prey? There are no plans yet to orbit the moon other than NASA’s crewed Artemis II mission in 2025.
The space tourism industry may still be plagued by supernova-sized hype as it was 25 years ago, but there are now many companies with more resources and a growing track record of successful commercial flights. There is.
If there’s a silver lining to all the hype, it’s that Americans don’t expect to go to space resorts or take luxury moon tours anytime soon. Travel companies other than Space Adventures do not actively want to enter the space travel business. And in the meantime, 2023 Pew Research Center Poll It found that 55% of Americans expect space travel to become routine, but don’t expect it to be available to the masses for another half century. Unless you have $100 million or so to spare, off-world travel still seems like a long way off.
