First Commercial Space Tourism Company

uberdave writes "The Canadian Arrow team (one of the contenders for the Ansari X-Prize) has joined forces with Dr. Chirinjeev Kathuria, a leading American entrepreneur, to form a new corporation called Planetspace. The goal of the company is to make space flight available to the public within 24 months. Geoff Sheerin, President of Canadian Arrow, says that Planetspace has entered final discussions with partners who will establish a reality television show set in space, and with a company to hold an international lottery with space flight prizes. Planetspace expects to fly almost 2,000 new astronauts in the first five years of flying. Fares will start at USD $250,000 for a suborbital flight, including fourteen days training."

Comments

Total cost of space flight

[mothlos]

So, if space flight really is becoming something consumers can do, what is the extra cost of all of the high atmospheric pollution and space junk? How are we going to keep low orbit from becoming the riskiest dodgeball court around?

Yes, this looks do-able

[anubi]

But should we?

Given the present condition of the supply of energies we have available and our rates of consumption, is this yet another luxury for the few that will needlessly deplete our supply of fuels?

Yes, I know the rich can easily afford it.

And with yet more demand on a the growing scarcity of petrochemical fuels powering the whole shebang, I guess we just watch fuel costs for everybody step up another notch. Economics. Supply and demand.

Sometimes I wonder where our head is at when we choose to expend limited resources so frivously.

But then, I have wondered that for a long time on other matters... its a wonder to me that America is still a "superpower" given the way we squander our resources.

Re:What about Virgin?

[peculiarmethod]

incidentally.. you should know that America's finances during it's inception were secured thanks to a lotto. That, and extreme trust in the value of the newly printed money. (they gave up relying on english monies for various reasons, including taxation and govt control) Lottos are the very reason gambling is next to legal in most states these days. It's very profitable, and it WILL ensure the survival of this company if they can secure the safety in technology and insurance. Watch.

not extensible

[deathguppie]

This is basically a single stage booster system based on 50 year old technoligy.

In order to move to higher "orbital" flights the cost of design and equiptment goes up in multiples using this old school rocketeering tech. It means that the average cost per person will go from $250,000 to more like $1.5M and that makes it highly unlikely that we will see anything more than suborbital shots from this. It's a cheap thrill ride but says nothing of our future space exploration.