And there is Space for All!

Ever thought an astronaut’s life was super exciting? Ever wanted to see the moon a bit closer? Ever wanted to lose all the weight life was burdening you with? Okay maybe just the weight gravity was giving you. But what if we tell you all this could be done? This is no superman comic, but SPACE TOURISM. You heard it right, Space is about to be open for tourists!

Who has this crazy idea you ask? Just a few billionaires who change how the world works once in a while; Sir Richard Branson’s ‘Virgin Galactic’, Elon Musk’s ‘SpaceX’ and Jeff Bezoz’s ‘Blue Origin’ are all running neck and neck trying to slingshot tourists into space. But don’t worry, it’s more like a boomerang. You’ll return all the same, safe and sound. But do keep the insurance papers ready, just in case. Both Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic plans to operate in the suborbital region spending only a little time in space, but that isn’t merely satisfactory for Mr. Musk, whose SpaceX plans orbital flights that will spend up to 5 days orbiting the blue planet.

The journey on Virgin will be more or less like a Kangaroo carrying a Joey (baby kangaroo) in its pouch. A carrier jet ‘WhiteKnightTwo’ will take the spacecraft to an altitude of ~50000 feet before the engine of ‘SpaceshipTwo’ kicks in and begins its journey to outer space. But both SpaceX and Blue Origin wants to stick to traditional rocket launching methods; the method is traditional anyway. SpaceX uses its flagship ‘Falcon 9’ rocket and Blue origin its ‘New Shepherd’ rocket; both reusable, highly efficient and incredible breakthroughs in rocket launching technology.

So far so good, isn’t it? But what about the price? Let’s just say your pocket needs to be really deep if you plan on taking this ride. Virgin charges $250,000 for a ticket and Musk’s orbital flights are expected to cost roughly 200 times as much. Blue Origin hasn’t decided the prices yet, but we don’t advice anyone to expect any miracles there either. So, unless you’re a multimillionaire, this might just seem a bit too fancy.Then why all this hype? It has everything to do with the revolution it brings in space travel and commercial air travel. You can board a flight from Mumbai, fly into space and land in New York an hour or so later, a journey that would normally take 16 painstaking hours. This is called Hypersonic Travel! Impressed yet? If not then think of the view through the window seat where you can see not boring buildings or clouds or empty fields, but the entire blue planet. And compared to the normal expenses for space travel, this only costs as much as a bus ticket. I did say compared.

Yes, it is way too expensive and yes, you’ll probably only be able to buy a seat if you’re filthy rich, but it’s always nice to have an option. The experience counts and it’s a hell of an experience alright. And once the competition really sets in, the prices are likely to go down, meaning if you start saving up, you might just be able to make the cut. So, we advise you set the balls rolling right now.

Its things like this that show how humans conquered this planet; ingenuity and enterprise, there’s no stopping that.

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