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Space tourism

The curvature of Earth seen from orbit provides one of the main attractions for tourists paying to go into space

Space tourism is the recent phenomenon of individuals paying for space travel, primarily for personal satisfaction.

As of 2007, space tourism opportunities are limited and expensive, with only the Russian Space Agency providing transport. The price for a flight brokered by Space Adventures to the International Space Station aboard a Soyuz spacecraft is now $30 million. Flights are fully booked until 2009.

Among the primary attractions of space tourism are the uniqueness of the experience, the thrill and awe of looking at Earth from space (described by astronauts as extremely intense and mind-boggling), the experience's notion as an exclusive status symbol, and various advantages of weightlessness. The space tourism industry is being targeted by spaceports in numerous locations, including California, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Florida, Virginia, Alaska, Esrange in Sweden and Wisconsin, as well as Singapore and the United Arab Emirates. Some use the term "personal spaceflight" as in the case of the Personal Spaceflight Federation.

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Falcon 1 prototype.

The Space Exploration Technologies Corporation (SpaceX) is a space-transportation startup company founded by Elon Musk. Its stated goal is to improve the cost and reliability of access to space "ultimately by a factor of ten". It is based in El Segundo, California, USA.

SpaceX is developing a family of partially reusable two-stage kerosene–liquid-oxygen launch vehicles.

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A rendering of a Canadian Arrow vehicle in flight.

The Canadian Arrow is a privately funded rocket and space travel project founded by London, Ontario, Canada entrepreneurs Geoff Sheerin, Dan McKibbon and Chris Corke. The project's objective is to take the first civilians into outer space, on a vertical sub-orbital spaceflight reaching an altitude of 112 km.

Canadian Arrow was considered one of the top three candidates for the X-Prize competition, along with Scaled Composites (Burt Rutan), and Armadillo Aerospace (John Carmack). Scaled Composites won the competition on October 4, 2004.

The Canadian Arrow team's motto is "making SPACE for you". They have completed the first series of tests on their 57,000 lbf (254 kN) thrust engine and have built a space training centre and a full scale mock-up of their rocket. After an open nomination process, they also recruited an impressive team of six astronauts from around the world, including several seasoned military pilots and a NASA trained astronaut from Ukraine.

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t/Space Spiral 2 elements edit

Did you know?

...that as of 2007, space tourism opportunities are limited and expensive, with only the Russian Space Agency providing transport. The price for a flight brokered by Space Adventures to the International Space Station aboard a Soyuz spacecraft is now $30 million. Flights are fully booked until 2009?

...that all five space tourists flew to and from the International Space Station on Soyuz spacecraft through the space tourism company Space Adventures?

...that on October 4, 2004, the SpaceShipOne, designed by Burt Rutan of Scaled Composites and funded by Virgin Galactic, won the $10,000,000 X Prize, which was designed to be won by the first private company who could reach and surpass an altitude of 62 miles (beyond the Karman line)?

...that SpaceShipTwo is a suborbital spaceplane currently under development by The Spaceship Company, a joint venture between Scaled Composites and Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Group, as part of the Tier 1b program. The Virgin Galactic spaceliner plans to operate a fleet of five of these craft in passenger-carrying private spaceflight service starting in late 2009?