Slashdot Mirror
Europe Unveils New Space Plane for Tourist Market
mrminator writes to tell us Space.com is reporting that Europe's largest space contractor, EADS, has just announced their plans to build a new space tourism vehicle. The new rocket, powered by liquid methane and liquid oxygen will carry passengers on a 90 minute round trip flight for somewhere in the neighborhood of 200,000 euros ($267,000).
$200,000 isn't that much to many people, so a target of 4,500 customers per year by 2020 seems reasonable.
On top of that, by 2020, many more "poor" people might also be able (and willing) to save up $200K for a taste of pseudo-space.
More importantly, no businessmen will allow one company to tap into this multibillion-dollar industry unchallenged, which means ticket price can only go down.
Virtual Betting on Facebook for non-geeks.
For that much money I would hope my 90 minute trip went further than around the neighbourhood.
liqbase
$267,000 is a lot of cash. Why right now you can get a seat on one of those 727s that can simulate zero Gs for a mere $3,675.00. Thats affordable for almost anyone who really wants to experience it. http://www.gozerog.com/
Libertarian Leaning Political Discussion Forum.
Cost issues aside, I think that 90 seconds of weightlessness in a 90 minute flight is rather lame. Aside from the nice view, wouldn't it be better to just rent out a stripped-down 747 and go into repeated dives, like they do to train astronauts for zero-g?
For me, anything that gets people investing in space is a good thing.
IMHO, and this does sound a bit corny, but there are two technologies that are the key to the survival for humans long-term... Energy and space, so people can get self-sustaining colonies on the moon, Mars, and outwards.
At about 18 Million per flight they would have to fly 55 flights to break even on their investment. Add on the maintenance cost they will incur and this looks like it will end up being AirBus space a 'company' which constantly has to be subsidized by European governments.
This also caught me "He said Astrium has surveyed other space-tourism projects, mainly in the United States, and found most of them lacking in engineering or business-model seriousness. "There are those who think you can design a rocket plane in a garage," Laine said. "Suffice it to say that that is not our niche."
Hello SS1? how many projects from Europe were serious contenders for the X-Prize? I would be willing to be that Virgin / SS1 is up in the air before this pipe dream..
That that just mean landing on Earth? How about they throw in a landing zone in Texas so that people can get an intercontinental flight out of it?
Help! I'm a slashdot refugee.
What so special about htis one, other than being six or seven years behind the crowd and just as expensive?
You can have one third of the zero-gravity time for two orders of magnitude cheaper: http://www.gozerog.com/
Lets be clear *if* private companies can make space tourism work in the end the technology will become much cheaper enabling us to further our reach into space (something not done since the Apollo Project)
Seriously, look it up, its science. Thank God they used a different, imaginary technology in Star Wars.
C-3PO: Sir, it's quite possible this asteroid is not entirely stable.
Han Solo: Not entirely stable! I'm glad you're here to tell us these things.
[The Millennium Falcon, under siege, won't start]
Princess Leia Organa: Would it help if I got out and farted?
Han Solo: It might.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
"Will these costs ever be recouped?"
Costs of governmental spending are never recouped. Governments spend money in this way to, indirectly, create and hold jobs. Side benefits include holding a skills base that can be utilised for national defence and future economic advantage.
Every government does it, pure capitalism does not deliver these benefits - namely because pure capitalism only cares about what the bottom line is on a weekly and monthly basis.
The is Earth getting very full - ecosystem are straining under the weight of 6.5 billion people - the future is up in the air, and all governments are, in every and anyway, wanting to ensure that they have the ability to compete in this very new environment.
Or does this thing look too much like the Planet Express ship for comfort.
Some mornings it's hardly worth chewing through the restraints to get out of bed.
Right now, the focus should be on exploration and discovery, rather than interspace joy rides. Scientists and governments should begin focussing on manned missions to Mars and the like, rather than tourism. Will Space become another touristy area? With a price that most fairly well off bussiness people and the like may afford, that may well be the case. I, for one, think that our focus and money need be on exploration and discovery, rather than tourism.
While a minute and a half is pretty cool, and this development is a step in the right direction, can someone maybe point out to the organization behind this, and especially to their marketing droids that they need a name change.
EADS -> (D)EADS
Not the best association, much?
To answer the posted question of "what's so special", it's the methane motor. NASA tested one, but nobody's flown with one yet.
. html
All the major hydrocarbon fuels are within about 3% of each other in specific impulse. Methane, being readily available via natural gas, is very handy. However, it's a gas, compressed to liquid. That means its density is less than a liquid. The major liquid fuel (RP-1; pretty much JP-4/Jet A kerosene) is 22% more dense since it's a liquid. To make a methane engine worth putting into a human-rated craft will require a major step in pressure tank development. They'll need to cram a lot of gas in, and it'll have to fail safe (ie. not explode if it leaks). I suspect EADS made this part of their R&D for the project, or they'd have just gone with RP-1. For a comparison of fuels see http://yarchive.net/space/rocket/fuels/fuel_table
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
Virgin Galactic: "Work on the SpaceShipTwo design and construction is well advanced. Testing of the SpaceShipTwo prototype is likely to start in 2007 with commercial flights on the maiden Virgin Galactic craft, the VSS (Virgin SpaceShip) Enterprise, commencing early in 2009." Rutan usually delivers on his promises and that being the case.. Other hurdles Virgin Galactic has gotten over "NASA and Virgin Galactic announce a ground breaking and exciting agreement between the two parties to collaborate in future manned space technology. In particular, NASA confirms its willingness to make available to Virgin Galactic the unique capabilities and world class facilities within the NASA Ames Research Centre in California." 2-22-07
I do not get why would anyone be willing to pay so much for a "extended" airplane trip. Riding a rocket to space and to the orbit is one thing. It takes bravery and provides an opportunity to live in really an outside world. But just to fly a bit higher then normal planes yet far far slower then what's needed for entering an orbit...? I just do not get it. Must be for people who really do not know what to do with their money. Some people think that private companies like that will eventually be able to fly into Earth orbit and beyond, but I think there is no reason to believe that it will happen anytime soon. Private companies can't brake laws of physics and are absolutely terrible with investing in fundamental physics research (the thing that costs tons and tons of money just to run an experiment that disprove a theory). So this is just a waste of money plain and simple.
Virgin is charging $200K a flight, these people are planning to charge a little more. Makes me want to ask a few market related questions:
a) How many people can afford to spend over $200K for a 90 minute thrill ride?
b) How many of those people would actually buy a ticket?
Seems like these companies are chasing after a very small market.
Where in the definition of 'pure capitalism' does it say that nobody cares about anything beyond the short term bottom line?
That might be a fair criticism of corporate capitalism in the 21st century. But even there historically (e.g. Bell Labs) corporations have been willing to invest in R&D. Someone it 50 years might be in a fair position to judge corporate R&D spending today.
Further R&D shouldn't be thought of as a jobs program (which is what's wrong with most government sponsored R&D).
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
14 or so seconds at a time. Bet it sucked.
90 seconds wouldn't be much better.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
If you're going into space on a 90 minute flight, why not actually GO somewhere, rather than returning to your point of origin?
How about a flight from London to Sydney in 90 minutes? That way you can at least have a nice holiday as part of the experience.
I've been waiting since the 80's for that aerospace plane that will get me from the USA to Australia in a matter of a couple of hours. What's up with that?
At $50 PER SECOND can anyone think of a more expensive hobby? Diamond studded golf in the bayou? Occupying Iraq? I'd expect at least one person to sign up simply to say they've done the most expensive thing a human can do.
On a similar note, I wonder if Snoop Dogg will fly it just so that he can claim to have gotten higher than any other stoner ever.
If you're curious, as I was, the war in Iraq has taken somewhere on the order of 133,000,000 seconds and cost on the order of $434,277,000,000 http://costofwar.com/ for a cost of roughly $3,265/second, an impressive number to be sure, right up until you divide it by the number of taxpayers.
Um, no. These little rocketplanes little in common with the challenges of real, orbital rocketry. Consequently, they contribute as much toward advancing the field as a company that builds bumper cars contributes to Formula One racing. "But hey -- they're making millions of bumper cars for amusement parks all across the country!" That doesn't change the fact that they're not really helping, because what they're making millions of is the wrong thing.
In this case, these things have trivial delta-V requirements (so they don't have to deal with things like compressors and can use heavy materials, poorer (but easier to work with) fuels, no/minimal staging, and so forth)), they have minimal thermal requirements (so they don't have to deal with a problematic TPS), they're not exposed to long-term temperature extremes (which effects hydraulics, fuel, and so forth), and countless other things. I could make a list if you wanted. This sort of task has much more in common with airplanes than it does with orbital rocketry.
Everybody point at the libertarian and laugh.
Methane is odourless. I believe the smell you find objectionable may be a mixture of methanal and methylamine
I think he means "poor" compared to the multimillionares that this kind of thing is targetted at. The occasional dentist or doctor, that kind of thing.
How much for one way?
Property is theft.
Smart guy. By asking for money and casually dismissing US success in the same breath, he'll be garnering a lot of support from folks who were put off by losing another space race to the Americans. The diss was calculated.
I think some people here are missing part of the draw of such a venture as this. People aren't interested in spending the money just for a minute and a half of weightlessness... they're interested in considering themselves astronauts. Once you break the 100km altitude mark--the Karman Line--you're in outer space. If you're in outer space, you're technically an astronaut. People want the title, as it is still somewhat exotic and mysterious.
If you think about it, space exploration is turning out to be just like the development of powered flight. It starts with a handful of daring, adventurous explorers, followed by governmental applications and novelties (like barnstorming and such), leading to common use by a large portion of society. Right now, we're moving through that second phase.
...do I bother recycling and trying to reduce my carbon footprint?
Nothing I ever do to change the way I live will have the least little effect so long as assholes are taking vacations in space.
--
Don't like it? Respond with words, not karma.
EADS is a random european company. So how does "Europe" unveil a new space plane? It doesn't. If the company in question was US-American would the headline read "USA Unveils New Space Plane"? No. So screw your stupid nationalism.
Throughout another article, they look down their noses at the efforts being undertaken referring to the engineering behind it all. We have ruled out the idea of a simple rocket, which can not be used again, or of a small vessel attached to a large plane, the idea chosen by Virgin Galactic of Richard Branson, but which seems to us less safe IOW, they knock spacex, t-space, and scaled composites. This is the SAME group that is taking forever to do the A-380, which is poorly engineered and in trouble due to nationalistic politics. In addition, they had to obtain more funding from EU to do another aircraft to compete against the 787. But they promised that the 380 would be the last.
Now, they say that Burt Rutan has horrible engineering. Burt's multitudes of aircrafts have set a number of records. Even later in that article, they speak of using hamocks which is straight out of one of the poor American companies (t-space). Spacex is looking at having rockets launch at a fraction of the price of the ariane V with slightly more payload due to "poor" engineering (and that is without the rocket re-use that they will employ). And all of that is without any gov. subsidy.
As to the design behind Scaled's work, it has been the EXACT same idea that NASA wanted in the 70's (but nixon killed). In addition, so did EU, at first, before settling on Ariane's design. The idea being to not carry the jets and their covers to space. By taking the approach that they suggest, they will either have to take 3 tanks to space or use a dropped fuel tank. IOW, they have not learned the lessons that the American Shuttle vs. The Russian Shuttle (a theft, but better designed by moving the engines off the shuttle). Scaled did. They will be able to get to space MUCH sooner than EADS just due to this one item. Scaled's WK II will be used to carry not just the sub-orbital rocket (SS1.5), but will also carry SS2. It will be far easier to convert the SS1.5 to SS2. And they will not have to worry about WK.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
It is the owner of airbus and has enjoyed large gov. support for developing the entire airbus planes. In addition, and more important, it is the designer of the Ariane and it was all paid for by EU. My guess is that they will be looking for another EU payment before long akin to what is happening with the Galileo sat, system.
As to USA reference, Yes, I would expect that a number of articles about spaceX's, scaled, and t-spaces to say that America did this. And it should. They are all American companies and most likely more than 75% of the tech will be American (though some subsystems may come from other western nations). And it would be written that way in EU papers.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
... think it through.
The idea behind this all is a bit more complicated then just providing (hopefully) two way trips to the borders of space. It is much more then that.
EADS builds a vehicle which is capable of repeatedly reaching this border. Since it takes off via conventional jet engines it doesn't need these launch pads like the us fleet of space crafts. Standard starting procedures via a runway, reusable - sounds almost like a standard airplane. And all this with a business modell that will pay for a reasonable amount of research and maintenance for this ship. 1.2 Billion $ which do not have to be paid for by tax payers.
Suddenly we come into a position where space tourism is on the border to become main stream. Granted, 200K$ is much. But wait some 10 or 20 years. When there will not only be 3 parties (Russia via their space fleet, virgin galactic and now EADS) providing such trips but maybe 10 or 20 companies. Prices will be in a reasonable region, the ships will be much advanced and pretty much standard.
Yt,
Gunnar
Lars T.
To the guy who modded me down from perfect to terrible Karma - Apple haters still suck
Um, no. These little rocketplanes little in common with the challenges of real, orbital rocketry. Consequently, they contribute as much toward advancing the field as a company that builds bumper cars contributes to Formula One racing. "But hey -- they're making millions of bumper cars for amusement parks all across the country!" That doesn't change the fact that they're not really helping, because what they're making millions of is the wrong thing.
Well, I agree that it won't help with the technology, but it might help with the sociology. In the same way that millions of kids love bumper cars and they carry that on into their adult life by supporting motor racing, maybe this will get more people into space (excuse the pun), which could then result in more investment in actual space travel. Well, we can hope?
is the response about why the EADS approach will be one of the more expensive, poorly designed and engineered.
"Like other spaceship concepts that takeoff from a runway (XCOR and Rocketplane) or those that do rocket-powered vertical launches, the EADS vehicle will weigh more than twice as much (per passenger) as SpaceShipTwo and require more than twice the rocket impulse," Rutan told me. "This relates to significant increases in operational costs," he added, also noting that failure modes on ascent tend to be more risky at low altitudes. "The non-recurring development cost of a suborbital spaceship that has rocket and jet engines -- both of which leave the atmosphere and experience reentry -- will be far more than our SpaceShipTwo program," he said.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
If I had the ability to blow $267,000, I think I would get more satisfaction from contributing to space research than I would from a simple 90-minute joyride. If a few of these rich folk pooled their money together they could make some cool deep space probe concept into reality, rather than just burning rocket fuel and having nothing to show for it.
Are they going to build the Clipper before or after the space plane?
People don't make more money over time. Money becomes worthless. $200,000 will be worth $10,000 in 2020, but anything which retains the same value will be $4,000,000. If anyone still values the $200,000 flight in 2020, it'll have the same value when dollars are 1/20th as valuable, and cost 20x more.