Almost exactly a year after examining what the well-dressed space tourist will wear, the New York Times reexamines the subject, this time looking at what designer Philippe Starck is proposing for Virgin Galactic. His current design is pretty basic: a “plastic-looking bodysuit with attenuated gloves and a dome helmet”, according to the Times. But that’s not his first design: he originally suggested that SpaceShipTwo passengers fly in the buff. Fortunately, “the prospect of what denuded passengers would look like in zero gravity made him reconsider.”
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USA Today takes a look today at the various people who have signed up to fly on Virgin Galactic, the usual mix of stars and starry-eyed folks, many of whom (like Victoria Principal) have gotten significant publicity already for signing up to fly on SpaceShipTwo. Virgin does reveal that they will be giving away two tickets: one to Stephen Hawking and the other to James Lovelock, who proposed the “Gaia” model of earth as a living organism. (Lovelock is profiled in the USA Today article.) A New York travel agent who is among those accredited by Virgin Galactic who has sold two tickets so far (to a hedge fund manager and a financial company CEO) said he’s found success marketing it as a “thrill sell”: “They’re going for the Wow!” Reuters has an article today on the struggles Russian cosmonauts encounter once they return to Earth after long-duration missions to the ISS. The article includes the opinions of one cosmonaut, Gennady Padalka, has about flying tourists on missions to the ISS: “On the one hand, when a guy comes along with a big sack of money and flies into space while other Earth dwellers can’t do that… of course, it isn’t good. But it’s good financial support.” I ran across this week this article about space tourism from a publication called The Student Operated Press. Pretty harmless stuff, until you read the roster of space tourists who have flown to the ISS: Denis Titio, Mark Shattlvort, George Olsen, Anyshe Ansary, and, most recently, Charles Simony. Yeah, that’s right. One possible reason for this, ah, non-standard spelling might be that the author is Ukrainian, posing thus some translation/transliteration problems, but that’s why there are editors, right? Zogby International has released a new survey that offers conflicting news for space tourism companies and proponents. The survey, conducted online in mid-March and released late last week, indicates that about 30 percent of Americans “are interested” in space tourism, although what “interested” means isn’t defined (interested in general? interested enough to participate if the price is right?) in the Zogby press release. However, the press release goes on to add that 41 percent said that “if money weren’t an issue, they would personally travel to the moon”, while 32 percent said the same about a trip to Mars. Does that make any sense? If 30 percent of the public are “interested” in space tourism, why would a larger number be interested in going to the Moon or Mars “if money were no object”? Unfortunately, the press release doesn’t offer any further details, not a look at the survey instrument used for this poll, so it’s hard to gauge the intent of the respondents. (Other parts of this survey, which touched on a wide range of space issues, also suffer from a similar degree of vagueness.) While proponents of space tourism may be heartened to see nearly a third of the American public “interested” in space tourism, without knowing more about the poll, it’s difficult to say whether that figure means much of anything. Virgin Galactic announced this week that it has signed up its first customer from the United Arab Emirates, Ibrahim Sharaf. He will apparently be one of the Founders, the first 100 to fly on Virgin’s suborbital flights. Not only will Sharaf get to fly to space, his company, Sharaf Travel, will be the accredited travel agents for Virgin Galactic in the UAE. The reports don’t mention whether Sharaf will be paying full fare—about $200,000—for the trip, or if he’ll be getting a discount as part of the sales deal. Australian newspapers reported over the weekend that Brisbane woman Glenys Ambe is the first person to book a flight on Virgin Galactic. First person? That’s going to be a bit of a surprise to the 100 or so Founders, plus anyone else who reached a deal with Virgin prior to Ms. Ambe; perhaps she’s the first person to book a flight through an accredited travel agent in Australia. If you think you have a clue regarding when Virgin Galactic will begin commercial service, and you’re not averse to or prohibited from gambling, you might be able to make a buck or two. Web site BetUS is taking bets on when Virgin Galactic’s first commercial spaceflight will take place. The leading time frame is May-August 2009, with odds of +275 ($275 won for $100 gambled), followed by September-December 2009 at +300 and January-April 2009 at +400. If you’re a pessimist, January-April and May-August 2011 are each at +1200. The full list of odds is on its web site, under “Future/props” and “Entertainment props”, alongside such key issues as Alec Baldwin, Britney Spears, and Survivor Fiji. It should be noted that, at the National Space Symposium last month, Alex Tai of Virgin Galactic said that the company was “well on course” for beginning commercial flights sometime in 2009 or 2010, a bit later than previously reported, although Virgin officials have made it clear that they’ll fly when the vehicle is ready, rather than try to stick with a specific timetable. Disclaimer: no, this post is not endorsing gambling, and such activities may be prohibited by law in your jurisdiction. As expected, the X Prize Foundation announced last week that the 2007 X Prize Cup will move to Holloman Air Force Base near Alamogordo, NM, where it will merge with the air show held at the base on October 27-28. With free admission this year (because the event is being held on an Air Force base), they are expecting as many as 100,000 people to attend, up from the approximately 15,000 people who were at the 2006 event. That sounds like a huge increase, but one person who attended the 2005 air show at Holloman estimated an attendance of 75,000, so 100,000 is not as big a reach as one might think. The key issue not addressed in the press release is what sort of “flavor” the event will have: will it be a space-oriented show, with some airshow-like events added on, as was the case with the 2005 and 2006 events (which had F-117 flybys and the like), or will they simply graft on the Lunar Lander Challenge and some static displays to an Air Force air show? We’ll have to see how this event comes together in the next several months. Cue the “Wide World of Sports” theme music, but watch out for that ski jump:
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