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? 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 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 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
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 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 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 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 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, 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. 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 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 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 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 out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join how Staff Work Staff as we explore the most promising and perplexing possibilities of tomorrow. The hou stef Works iPhone app has arrived. Download it today on iTunes.