So you want to be a space tourist like Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson and Elon Musk? You’ll need patience and a lot of money
- Two companies, Bezos’ Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic, founded by Branson, are offering short ‘suborbital’ experiences of a few minutes – but they aren’t cheap
- Carbon dioxide emissions from space tourism are a big concern given the Earth’s climatic breakdown – but if you can’t boast about it, why would you still go?
Richard Branson has been, Jeff Bezos will go on Tuesday and Elon Musk has reportedly booked a seat As for thrill-seekers who aren’t billionaires, they might soon be able to get their own adrenaline kicks and Instagram snaps from the final frontier, as space tourism finally lifts off.
All you’ll need is a bit of patience and a lot of money – as well as to be able to overcome any concerns you may have about your carbon footprint.
Two companies are offering short “suborbital” hops of a few minutes: Bezos’ Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic, founded by Branson.
Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket takes off vertically and the crew capsule detaches and crosses the Karman line (62 miles, or 100km, up), before falling back to Earth with three parachutes.
Virgin Galactic uses a massive carrier plane, which takes off from a horizontal runway then drops a rocket-powered spaceplane. This in turn soars to over 50 miles altitude before gliding back.
In both cases, up to six passengers are able to unbuckle from their seats to experience a few minutes of weightlessness and take in the view of Earth from space. Virgin Galactic has said regular commercial flights will begin from 2022, following two more test flights. Its waiting list is already long, with 600 tickets so far sold. But the company predicts it will eventually run up to 400 flights per year.
