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).

Comments

$Ka-ching

[mastershake_phd]

$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/

90 seconds?

[Judinous]

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?

Pipe Dream?

[N3WBI3]

"Auque said the company has determined that designing and flight-qualifying its proposed space plane would require 1 billion euros in investment."

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..

Re:Cheap Thrill

[L. VeGas]

$200,000 isn't that much to many people, so a target of 4,500 customers per year by 2020 seems reasonable. Quite right, young man. I spend more than that in a week on fresh orchids and chewing gum.

Jeeves, fetch me my spats and pour me a brandy. I'm headed to the sky! Oh, and replace those twenty dollar bills in the lavatory with hundreds. The twenties are too scratchy.

Is this what we need at the moment?

[perlhacker14]

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.

Methane in Space

[DynaSoar]

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.

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. html

Re:Cheap Thrill

[fbjon]

You mean 200.000€. It's 33% more.

Pricing

[mqduck]

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).

How much for one way?