When most people arrive in Las Vegas, they make a beeline for the casinos. Me, I went in a different direction (literally and figuratively), paying a visit to the corporate headquarters of Bigelow Aerospace in Las Vegas. (This is a separate location from their manufacturing facility in North Las Vegas.) I spent over an hour there interviewing Robert Bigelow about Genesis 1, the company’s future plans, and related issues. All this will appear in an article (or two) in future issues of The Space Review, but here are a few highlights:
- Genesis 1 is performing very well in orbit, and its cameras have returned “hundreds” of images, only a fraction of which have been released. They are limited to primarily low-resolution images at the moment because they’re using a lower-bandwidth UHF antenna; a slow roll of the spacecraft (which will damp out in a few weeks) makes it hard to maintain a lock on the S-band antenna.
- The images returned include some of the interior of the spacecraft, which haven’t been released yet because they include some company logos; the company is working to get permission from those companies so that they can release the logos. (The logos are there principally to help calibrate the cameras.)
- Genesis 2 is scheduled for launch from Russia late this year, either in the latter half of November or December. It will be very similar to Genesis 1 but with a few “tweaks”, including more cameras and improved life support systems.
- The company has gotten a good response to their “Fly Your Stuff” promotion, particularly flying items in the spacecraft.
- ITAR (export control) has been a huge problem for the company, since they’re launching items from Russia, although Bigelow emphasized they don’t have a problem with the people handling the export control work, but instead the policies and general bureaucracy.
- Bigelow said that up to 44 teams expressed an interest in America’s Space Prize (ASP), but with few exceptions these groups did not appear to have the wherewithal to make a serious run at the prize. Although NASA’s COTS program attracting the attention of industry these days (including teams that would otherwise have a shot as ASP; taking government funding is a disqualifying factor for the prize), he said there are no plans to change the purse size or deadline.
- While Bigelow is supportive of space tourism in general, and likes the developments going on in the suborbital arena, he thinks a much bigger market for his company’s modules will be from national space agencies, who want the prestige of a national astronaut corps and their own (albeit leased) space station. Such agencies, he noted, have much bigger pockets than individual space tourists.
There’s a lot more to the interview than these notes, so stay tuned for more in the days to come.
The space agencies may have much bigger pockets than individual space tourists, but there are a lot more of the latter. How may of the hotel guests, real estate clients etc. of Bigelow’s earth-bound properties are government officials or government agencies? With a near-term ‘X’ type demo of the needed robust orbital RLV technologies (by a reliable source, this would cost $150million or less) there could be the vehicles ready to allow the tourist trade to be the biggest part of Bigelow’s users from the start.
He shouldn’t rely on governments to buy enough of his modules, even at the start. But since he’s developing them, it’s the responsibility of the rest of us to push for the transportation demos required to make make money.
[…] A day after a visit to Bigelow Aerospace’s corporate headquarters to interview Robert Bigelow, myself and a number of other reporters traveled up to the company’s manufacturing facility in an industrial park in North Las Vegas (with a spectacular view of the Las Vegas skyline) for a press conference and tour. At the press conference, Robert Bigelow and six other company employees, including project manager Eric Haakonstad, entertained questions for an hour about Genesis 1 and the company in general. A lot of the questions covered the same ground I did with Bigelow himself yesterday; MSNBC’s Alan Boyle has an excellent summary, with photos, of the event. (While those on a separate tour of the plant organized by the Space Frontier Foundation could not take photos, reporters on a separate tour could, albeit with significant restrictions, as Alan discussed in his Cosmic Log account.) […]
I would imagine that the equatorial launch, suggested above, would be in expectation of the space elevator. With competitions ongoing, perhaps development will be completed by the time it is needed. I believe that the space elevator requires an equatorial base.
[…] For this week’s issue of The Space Review, I wrote an extended article about Bigelow Aerospace based on Robert Bigelow’s speech at the NewSpace 2006 conference Friday, a media tour of the Bigelow Aerospace factory in North Las Vegas the previous day, and the interview I had with Bigelow last week as well. The intent of the article was to provide a comprehensive overview of many of the items I mentioned in my notes from the interview last week, going into more detail where possible. […]
Bigelow is thinking big. He wants to build his own version of a space station. It really isn’t fair to compare it to the ISS. This thing will be gigantic. Some of the modules that will be linked together in Bigelow’s mini-planet could be rented out to friendly foreign nations, places like Chile, Australia, or Japan, who might yearn for a chance to have their own astronauts or researchers up there but who are unlikely to get a ticket to the ISS. Other modules could be rented out to big corporations or labs that will conduct basic research. And an entire other section could serve as a hotel. The concept of a space hotel is what Bigelow first discussed when he launched his personal space program, and it’s what has attracted quite a bit of attention to his undertaking. He still thinks it’s doable, and is confident he can bring the cost of a three-week stay in space down form $20 million to about $8 million, still a big chunk of change, but certainly affordable for a lot of people.
Are you freaken NUTS!!! $8 million for a 3 week vacation in a space station! With $8 million i could put 40,000 homeless familys in to their own homes!
Mr. Robert T. Bigelow ;. you may be a rich and powerfull man ,but where is your humanity!
M. Lewis, it’s not the facts or substance of Paul’s statement… it never is with the more liberal mindset… it’s the good intentions behind his statement that should get commended….
Mr. Bigelow and his ilk are exactly what this nation needs to inspire a second and private space race. We need to build a space based industry and expand capitalism. In the US, the only way you are poor is by choice… ANYONE can make it… and if you don’t, you’re lazy.
MR BIGELOW I DEAL WITH PEOPLE ALL DAY LONG THAT LIVE IN THE STREETS, UNDER THE BRIDGE, OUT IN THE DESERT IN BEAT UP CAMPS WITH TRAILERS WITHOUT WHEELS OR APPLIANCES. THEY HAVE JUST METAL WALLS TO STAY OUT OF THE ELEMENTS. 8 MILLION DOLLARS FOR A 3 WEEK STAY. YOU ARE KIND OF ARROGANT ARE YOU NOT. SURELY NOT REALISTIC IN WHAT THIS COUNTRY REALLY NEEDS. WITH YOUR KIND OF MONEY MAYBE YOU SHOULD BE GIVING BACK MORE TO SOCIETY INSTEAD OF TRYING TO MAKE A NAME FOR YOURSELF. A VERY CLOSE PERSON TO ME WORKED FOR YOU FOR OVER 13 YEARS AND HE PUT MONEY INTO YOUR POCKET. HE PUT HIS LIFE ON THE LINE CLEANING UP DRUG INFESTED PIT HOLES KICKING OUT UNDESIREABLES THAT WOULD RATHER SHOOT YOU THAN PAY RENT. HE THOUGHT HE WAS GROWING WITH YOUR COMPANY BUT YOU WOULD NEVER SHAKE HIS HAND FOR YOU THOUGHT YOU WERE BETTER THAN HIM. HE’D TELL ME STORIES WHERE HE WOULD PUT OUT HIS HAND AND YOU WOULD TAKE TWO STEPS BACK LIKE THE PLAGUE TO PREVENT JUST A HAND SHAKE. HE GAVE YOU A GOOD 15 YEARS OF CAREER TIME. YOU NEVER ONCE THANKED HIM OR COMMENDED HIM FOR HIS EFFORTS. HE BROUGHT IN ALOT OF MONEY FOR YOU IN PROPERY MANAGEMENT. IN THE END YOU TOOK ALMOST $50,000.00 FROM HIM BY LAYING HIM OFF ONLY MONTHS BEFORE HIS ACCT WAS TO BE DEPOSITED WITH RETIREMENT MONEY. MR BIGELOW YOU DID IT TO OTHER CO WORKERS ALSO. THIS PERSON I KNOW NOW IS DISABLED AT 51. HIS PROGNOSIS IS A WHEELCHAIR BY 60. 15 YEARS WASTED IN RETIREMENT SAVING YEARS. MAYBE ONE OF THOSE TRAILERS IN THE DESERT FOR RETIREMENT. YOU HAD THE GREATEST, KINDEST , LOYALIST COMPANY MAN WORKING FOR YOU AND YOU PUT HIM DOWN PLUS ALOT OF HIS CO-WORKERS. HOW CAN I READ ABOUT THIS SPACE PROJECT AND BE EXCITED. I THINK THE REAL HIGH ACHIEVERS AND SUCCESSFUL PEOPLE ARE PEOPLE PERSONS WITH COMPASSION TOWARDS PEOPLE. A PERSON THAT CAN GIVE A HAND SHAKE TO ALL THE WORKER BEES NOT JUST THE QUEEN BEE. I’VE HAD THIS ON MY MIND FOR A LONG AND AM PROUD I CAN HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO SHARE MY THOUGHTS.