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Walk in Space for $15 Million (Plus Airfare)
avtchillsboro writes "A NY Times article has details on a news release by Space Adventures Ltd. (SAL). SAL has previously provided space trips to three wealthy individuals for (US)$20 million. The article announces the $15 million EVA 'upgrade', and quotes SAL chief executive Eric Anderson, who says that the plan has been approved by the Federal Space Agency of the Russian Federation; but the article also says that NASA has not been informed." From the article: "Fewer than 450 people have traveled to space, and the club of spacewalkers is even more exclusive. Just 151 people have stepped outside the relative safety of their craft to greet the void with only a visor to separate life and death. 'Spacewalk is the ultimate experience that we've managed to invent as humans,' said Tom Jones, a former astronaut and spacewalker who is an adviser to Space Adventures. Being outside the craft when 'there's nothing between you and the ground below but empty space,' he said, is 'incomparable.'"
Assuming that this is an EVA from the ISS they could egress from the Russian airlock but if there is a problem with that airlock they may have to enter through the US airlock. While outside they may have to interact with US hardware such as the external surfaces of the modules, communication gear, etc.
I think NASA should definitely have a say in who does EVAs around the ISS.
Also I think an EVA from a Soyuz would be out of the question on safety grounds.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
Since space adventures are (apparently) doing so well with their business perhaps they should buy the ISS. NASA doesn't really need to own it anyway.
They could lease back a couple of permanant spots in the station from the new owners and establish an arrangement for safe harbour in the case of a shuttle failure, at least until 2010.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
It's more than a thrill. Doing something extreme, such as space flight, or even parachuting, bungee jumping, or armed combat increases a person's natural abilities. Although not commonly known, I would assume that if an ordinary person, with little or no building or moneymaking abilities did something as amazing as ascending to a million feet up in the air (or however high up this spacewalk is), their building and/or moneymaking abilities, and also their decisionmaking and other mental and physical abilities, should increase dramatically. Other, cheaper ways than spacewalking (wtf is up with $15 million? Is this only for Bill?) include blowtorching, shooting, fighting, using explosions for a variety of things, trapping animals, extreme and other sports...pretty much anything dangerous should increase a person's abilities, provided they survive intact. The amount of risk is usually proportional to the increase, and should be easy to measure for both the person partaking in the extreme, and the people around that person.
A good way to decrease a person's abilities is to sit around in a classroom, listening to a person talk about pointless, useless topics, then writing what they said on a piece of paper. Do that for 6 hours a day, 5 days a week, and you'll get a world of useless idiots. Then, when people wonder why there seems to not be enough money, remember that if there existed a ficticious society of 1000 people, and each person on average built 100 things, then they all traded the things they made through fair trade with money in a scattered way, each person on average would end up with 100 things. Extending that to the American population, each person should get a ton of papers...and little else. Luckily food grows itself, or we all would have starved by now.
Is there any way for a person born into the 'middle class' of American society (access to education, minimal crime suburban living) to make 20 million, much less 35 million, before they are too old to go to space? Let's arbitrarily choose a cutoff age of 60.
I can think of ways that a person MIGHT be able to accumulate this much wealth (I am ommitting exceptional cases, like being one of an enormous number of computer scientists to invent an effective search engine, or doing whatever it takes to be selected as corporate CEO) , but markets change over a person's career fast enough that there's just no way to know.
For instance, the highest paying profession today that a person can take a known route to (there's no known route to becoming a corporate CEO or Donald Trump of real estate) that I can think of would be a specialty surgeon. But, that's in today's market : a surgeon is just a highly skilled technician, the reason salaries are so high is because of the extremely large workload and limited supply of surgeons. (for instance, if a surgeon made the average salary of $200,000 a year but worked 80 hours a week, they only make about 50 bucks an hour. Numerous other jobs make that much money, just noone works those hours)
It is doable : if the person finished their education at 30, they have 30 years to make 15 million dollars. TODAY in some specialties, like orthopedics, the average salary is several hundred thousand. Prudent investment, with decent interest rates, might mean a person would only need to invest about 5 million 15 years earlier, and receive the average overall historical rate of return for the stock market.
No guarantees...but it sounds doable.
Lawyers also have a good shot. If you cashed in on just one million dollar settlement every 2 years, making the 30-40% contingency, plus collecting fees for other smaller cases, a lawyer could make the money. Potentially, much sooner : represent the parents of a crippled child because some deep pocket entity made a preventable error, and 30% of the 10 million dollar settlement is yours. Invest it, and plan on going to space in 15 years. Only a tiny fraction of the lawyers in this country ever collect on something that big, I suspect, however. (I don't actually know if this is the case)
All of this assumes many things, 30 years ago (1976) no-one could have predicted that commercial space flight would be available for 15 million dollars. Most people would have probably assumed it would be much, much cheaper and more common, actually. Or un-available.
I wonder what other unique life experiences can be had for 15 million. I can't think of anything that costs more than a million, actually. An enormous mansion or private jet doesn't count, that isn't unique enough.
You have to take risks, work your butt off, and be a little lucky.
Did you see the recent article on the 10 dumbest internet sales ideas that made money?
Does that give you a hint?
Look, there are many successful people who had a great many stupid ideas. The nice thing is that the stupid ideas they had are usually forgotten, unless they already are rich and then they get ridiculed for awhile until their next big success.
People constant rant that the middle class has no chance. Well that is bunk. Hell you picked lawyers and such (with unrealistic views of what the majority get into) and many of them came from middle class families. Lots of doctors are the same way.
Do you have what it takes to dedicate 8+ years to learn a trade, and then another 8-16 to be very successful at it?
Most people don't. That is what separates those who make the transition from lower/middle/upper to the ranks of millionaires. Many people reach a level of contentment. They are happy and see no reason to push. For others its a dream worth obtaining.
Got to love some of the typical whine responses I saw, about how wasteful it is, especially throwing out the guilt card. I don't what is worse, posters throwing the guilt card or race card. Seems the whiners always have a deck to play with. Yet society doesn't move on without people having dreams and the incentive to get there.
There probably are a lot of HS/College students this day looking to go to space. Many will plan for it and only a few will succeed. A lot of that success is from hard work and dedication. Sure luck will help but if you count on it you are already half way to failing.
The common thread among the guys we label "the owners" of the company I work for is that they put in more hours than most people imagine. Two of them are over 75 and they still "work". The spend their freetime alright, but they still work. Yet they got where they were because they did put in the hours. Do you have what it takes to put in 60-80 hours a week for dozens of years?
So, middle class or not, a spacewalk is possible for almost anyone. The key is making it happen. Hell, who knows, by the time you have the money needed you probably will have found something else to do with it. You might even be one to shut the whiners up by dedicating large amounts to hunger!
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
The suits themselves are complicated little machines,
The NASA suits are (over-?) complicated machines. The Russian suits are much simpler in design. (Most studies I've seen of "next generation" suits borrow a lot from Russian design.) Certainly anyone capable of learning technical diving or commercial diving can learn to handle a space suit, and you're just as dead if something goes wrong in the former cases as the latter.
As for the "physically grueling" aspect, tourists are just going to be floating around sightseeing, not doing maintenance or construction work.
-- Alastair
Sure.
But what about all the people that enjoy gimmicks ?
Do you think they'd fork over $20 USD for a chance to walk in space ?
I do, only because I've seen alot of people fork over $20 USD for scratchoff lottery tickets where the prize is $1 million dollars.
Hell, do you know how many times I've forked over that $20 ? I had a stack of tickets 2 inches thick before I gave up.
Sure, Slashdot readers might not like the idea of buying a ticket, maybe some would, but you can't deny that lottery tickets have been around for quite a long time, so they have to appeal to someone.
Wanna fight ? Bend over, stick your head up your ass, and fight for air.
Technically, you are better off spending, say $52 on lotto tickets on one draw where the prize is "big", rather than one per week, when the prize is way too low vs the odds.
1 ticket = 1 chance in 142 million, 2 tickets = 1 chance in 71 million, etc... assuming you don't pick the same numbers on each ticket, of course :-)
BTW - in Vegas, I think they only look to see if you have over 20$ in play... then you get free drinks. I figure I make about $6/hr playing video poker, with what I am willing to wager. It is not a loss, but not better than flipping burgers. However, it is much better than most people do in Vegas. I'm with you, I'd prefer to spend money to see Penn & Teller or something, not watch it dwindle on losing propositions.
Lottos (and Slot Machines) are crappy games, odds-wise, but they are worth a buck, once in a while, if you can afford it, but no more than that. If it was your day to get hit by lightning while being stung by a bee - maybe you will win, you'll need it to pay the hospital bills...
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
Actually, there is a view that space tourism is the key to making space flight affordable. Space tourism - unlike satellite launches, or science - can grow to a large number of launches per year. Therefore economies of scale can come in to play. According to this article http://www.spacefuture.com/archive/public_choice_e conomics_and_space_policy_realising_space_tourism. shtml space tourism is the key to economically viable space travel.
Low cost to orbit made possible by space tourism then opens up the really interesting space opportunities.
In theory, there's no difference between theory and practice; in practice there is.