The Future and Present of Space Tourism
Since 2001, six self-funded space tourists have headed up to the International Space Station.
The shortest stay was nine days, the longest fifteen.
What was previously purely in the realms of science fiction is now also available to the super rich.
But, as advancements are made and more companies get involved, the cost is expected to come down, though not to an affordable level for the average holiday maker.
Whilst this may happen eventually, it is doubtful that it will do so in our lifetimes.
Orbital space tourism will remain something that only the ultra rich can afford.
What may become available to those who are merely rich are suborbital flights.
With pre-bookings currently costing $200,000 per passenger, Virgin Galactic's suborbital flights are incredibly cheap compared to the $25 - $35 million that the self-funded orbital tourists paid.
This cost is expected to drop as time goes on, eventually even getting as low as $20,000.
Suborbital flights are nowhere near as impressive as a fifteen day stay on the International Space Station as it orbits the planet, but they're not exactly mundane either.
According to Virgin's plans, the most coherent currently available, a flight will last two and a half hours, but only a fraction of that will be above the hundred kilometre mark that forms the internationally recognised boundary of space.
The passenger craft will be taken to an altitude of fifty thousand feet by a mother craft, and will then be released to travel the rest of the journey on its own.
For its descent, it will glide down in unpowered flight.
The time between those two events, though, is what people will be paying for.
After breaking the boundary between Earth's atmosphere and space, they can enjoy up to six minutes of weightlessness, look out to see star-filled space without any twinkle added by the atmosphere, and see the curvature of the Earth below them.
As unlikely as it is that any of us will experience such a thing, it is possible that our children, or our children's children, will have the opportunity to truly visit space.
The shortest stay was nine days, the longest fifteen.
What was previously purely in the realms of science fiction is now also available to the super rich.
But, as advancements are made and more companies get involved, the cost is expected to come down, though not to an affordable level for the average holiday maker.
Whilst this may happen eventually, it is doubtful that it will do so in our lifetimes.
Orbital space tourism will remain something that only the ultra rich can afford.
What may become available to those who are merely rich are suborbital flights.
With pre-bookings currently costing $200,000 per passenger, Virgin Galactic's suborbital flights are incredibly cheap compared to the $25 - $35 million that the self-funded orbital tourists paid.
This cost is expected to drop as time goes on, eventually even getting as low as $20,000.
Suborbital flights are nowhere near as impressive as a fifteen day stay on the International Space Station as it orbits the planet, but they're not exactly mundane either.
According to Virgin's plans, the most coherent currently available, a flight will last two and a half hours, but only a fraction of that will be above the hundred kilometre mark that forms the internationally recognised boundary of space.
The passenger craft will be taken to an altitude of fifty thousand feet by a mother craft, and will then be released to travel the rest of the journey on its own.
For its descent, it will glide down in unpowered flight.
The time between those two events, though, is what people will be paying for.
After breaking the boundary between Earth's atmosphere and space, they can enjoy up to six minutes of weightlessness, look out to see star-filled space without any twinkle added by the atmosphere, and see the curvature of the Earth below them.
As unlikely as it is that any of us will experience such a thing, it is possible that our children, or our children's children, will have the opportunity to truly visit space.
