Will space tourism become a reality?

With private companies frantically searching for new ways to take people into orbit, it seems that space tourism could become a reality (for those who can afford it). But will it ever really happen? Tune in and learn more in this podcast.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to brainstuff from house storks dot com where smart happens. Hi,
am arest brain with today's question, will space tourism ever
become a reality? And if so, when might that happen?

(00:21):
For decades, space travel has been the province of nations.
A nation like the United States would select a handful
of people, train them extensively, anoint them as astronauts, and
send them into space at very great cost. That model
changed slightly in two thousand one, a businessman named Dennis
Tito paid twenty million dollars or so to become the

(00:44):
first person to pay for a ride into space. Mr.
Tito can therefore be called the first space tourist. His
flight took him to the International Space Station, where he
stayed for seven days. Mark Shuttleworth was the second space
or is to travel to the International Space Station in
two thousand two. So far, seven people have flown to

(01:06):
the International Space Station in this way, and they are
the only members of the elite group of space tourists
on planet Earth. But that exclusive club is about to
gain many more members. In two thousand and twelve, if
all goes as planned, the first regularly scheduled flights into
space should begin on Virgin Galactic, and several other competitors

(01:28):
should follow shortly thereafter. Let's take a look at how
the space tourism industry may unfold in the years to come.
Some people might not consider the Virgin Galactic flights to
be truly worthy of the title space flight. The first
Virgin Galactic missions will not orbit the Earth. Space tourists
on these flights will instead travel about a hundred kilometers

(01:51):
or sixty two miles high, and then return to Earth
just after a few minutes of weightlessness. A flight on
Virgin Galactic will initially cost about two hundred thousand dollars.
These flights also will look nothing like the traditional space
mission that people have become familiar with by watching NASA
flights on TV. There will be no huge, monolithic rockets

(02:14):
sitting on a launchpad, for example. Instead, passengers will board
a small airplane like space vehicle that holds six people.
This vehicle will be strapped underneath a much larger airplane.
That larger airplane will take off from a traditional runway
and fly to an altitude of fifty thousand feet. The

(02:34):
space vehicle will then detach and fire its rocket engine
to go from fifty thousand feet to three hundred and
forty thousand feet or so, which is a hundred kilometers up.
Once the rocket engine burns out, passengers will experience weightlessness
and we'll be able to see the blackness of space
with the Earth curving off down below. The whole experience

(02:55):
will require two days of training and the actual flight
will last approximately to an a half hours. Why won't
these Virgin galactic flights go orbital? Why do they go
up and then immediately come back down. It has to
do with the size and complexity of the spacecraft and
therefore the cost of the flight. On Virgin's first generation spaceship,

(03:17):
the maximum speed is MOCK three, or roughly two thousand
miles per hour. To go into orbit, the ship would
need to reach seventeen thousand miles per hour. This requires
much more fuel for the launch, and orbital speeds also
require a heat shield for re entry. Orbital flights could
be available in the not too distant future, at least theoretically.

(03:39):
In December two thousand and ten, a company called SpaceX
demonstrated one possible scenario, launching its dragging capsule atop a
Falcon nine rocket and safely bringing it back to Earth
after several orbits of the planet. SpaceX has received a
NASA contract to ferry cargo to the International Space Station
and could conceivably earn into space tourism as well. Once

(04:02):
space tourists are in orbit, they'll need a place to go.
Bigelow Aerospace may provide the first destination with its orbiting
commercial space station. Bigelow has already launched two prototypes called
Genesis one in Genesis two. These are inflatable modules with
thick skins that provide shielding, insulation, and structure. If everything

(04:24):
goes as planned, the inflatable space station itself will launch
in several pieces starting in or So. Perspective clients include
nations and corporations interested in microgravity research, as well as
individuals looking for space tourism opportunities. Assume that this all
goes as planned. As early as or So, we may

(04:48):
see normal people. I'll be at rich ones in orbit
and staying in space hotels on a regular basis. The
tickets will be expensive, true, but they will still be
in reach of many people from there. The hope is
that prices can fall and demand can increase to the
point where space tourism becomes routine. Be sure to check

(05:11):
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