Tag: space tourism
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Space Adventures looks for a customer to do a spacewalk after Russia gives its OK
NASA astronaut Mike Fincke conducts a spacewalk in a Russian spacesuit during his stint on the International Space Station in 2004. (NASA Photo) BELLEVUE, Wash. — Russian space officials say that they’ve signed off on a commercial deal with Virginia-based Space Adventures to fly two customers to the International Space Station in 2023 — and…
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Space Perspective reboots vision of flying passengers to stratosphere on a balloon
Space Perspective’s balloon-borne capsule, known as Spaceship Neptune, would provide a wide-angle view of the Florida coastline. (Space Perspective Illustration) The space entrepreneurs who planned to send passengers ballooning into the stratosphere for astronaut’s-eye views of the Earth below, way back in 2013, have revived the idea for a new venture called Space Perspective. Co-CEOs…
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Axiom Space makes deal with SpaceX to send customers to space station next year
An artist’s conception shows SpaceX’s Crew Dragon space taxi docking with the International Space Station. (SpaceX / NASA Illustration) Axiom Space says it’s signed a contract with SpaceX to fly three paying passengers and an Axiom-trained commander to the International Space Station aboard a Crew Dragon spaceship as soon as the second half of next…
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Two-time spaceflier Charles Simonyi offers advice for commercial space travelers
With a photo of his Soyuz launch in the background, Microsoft’s Charles Simonyi talks about spaceflight’s physical effects at a Hacker News Seattle Meetup. (GeekWire Photo / Alan Boyle) Microsoft billionaire Charles Simonyi is the only man on Earth to buy a multimillion-dollar ride to orbit not just once, but twice — so it’s worth…
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Virgin Galactic resumes taking deposits for SpaceShipTwo suborbital trips
Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo rocket plane and its WhiteKnightTwo mothership arrive at Spaceport America in New Mexico. (Virgin Galactic via YouTube) Virgin Galactic says it’s letting customers pay $1,000 refundable deposits toward suborbital trips on its SpaceShipTwo rocket plane, resuming spaceflight sales after a hiatus of more than a year. In a news release, Virgin Galactic…
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Space Adventures announces plans to fly private citizens on SpaceX crew capsule
A look inside the cabin of a SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft. Credit: SpaceX Building on development for NASA’s commercial crew program, Space Adventures announced an agreement Tuesday with SpaceX to fly up to four paying space tourists on a standalone mission aboard a Crew Dragon spacecraft in late 2021 or 2022 that could reach an…
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WOW! Virgin Galactic’s next SpaceShipTwo rocket plane reaches ‘Weight on Wheels’ milestone
The rocket plane that’s due to become Virgin Galactic’s second commercial suborbital spaceship can now stand on its own two feet — or to be more precise, on its own landing gear. Virgin Galactic Holdings’ manufacturing subsidiary, known as The SpaceShip Company, reached the “Weight on Wheels” milestone when it assembled all of the SpaceShipTwo…
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Virgin Galactic soars and then levels off on first day as publicly traded space company
British billionaire Richard Branson rings the New York Stock Exchange’s First Trade Bell to celebrate the listing of Virgin Galactic Holdings as a publicly traded company. (Virgin Galactic Photo / Courtney Crow) Like the rocket plane it operates, Virgin Galactic’s stock price blasted off on its first day as a publicly traded company, and then…
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Suborbital spacefliers will get pinned by the Association of Space Explorers
Virgin Galactic’s chief astronaut trainer, Beth Moses, gets her suborbital spaceflier pin from Michael Lopez-Alegria of the Association of Space Explorers. (GeekWire Photo / Alan Boyle) WASHINGTON, D.C. — Will the customers who fly on the suborbital spaceships operated by British billionaire Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic and Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin get astronaut…
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Blue Origin’s CEO says first space trips on New Shepard will cost ‘hundreds of thousands of dollars’
Blue Origin CEO Bob Smith shows a video of a BE-4 rocket engine firing during the Aerospace Futures Alliance Summit in 2018. (GeekWire Photo / Alan Boyle) Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin space venture has always shied away from saying how much it will cost to fly to the edge of the final frontier…