{"id":18578,"date":"2018-04-05T17:22:47","date_gmt":"2018-04-05T09:22:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/orion-span-says-itll-put-space-hotel-in-orbit-by-2022-but-some-details-are-up-in-the-air\/"},"modified":"2018-04-05T17:22:47","modified_gmt":"2018-04-05T09:22:47","slug":"orion-span-says-itll-put-space-hotel-in-orbit-by-2022-but-some-details-are-up-in-the-air","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/orion-span-says-itll-put-space-hotel-in-orbit-by-2022-but-some-details-are-up-in-the-air\/","title":{"rendered":"Orion Span says it\u2019ll put space hotel in orbit by 2022, but some details are up in the air"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Aurora
An artist\u2019s conception shows Orion Span\u2019s Aurora Station. (Orion Span Illustration)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A startup called Orion Span says it\u2019s planning to open a luxury hotel in orbit in 2022, but a lot of the details have yet to be filled in.<\/p>\n

The plan to launch the module into space, and take reservations from customers for multimillion-dollar trips, was announced today at the Space 2.0 Summit in San Jose, Calif.<\/p>\n

Orion Span says its hotel habitat, dubbed Aurora Station, will be about the size of a large private jet\u2019s cabin, with 5,650 cubic feet of pressurized space. It\u2019ll accommodate up to six residents at a time, including two professional crew members.<\/p>\n

The flight plan calls for the module to be launched into a 200-mile-high orbit in late 2021, and host its first guests in 2022.<\/p>\n

Guests would go through three months of pre-flight training, including an online certification program and in-person training at a facility in Houston. They\u2019d then be launched to Aurora Station to spend 12 days in space.<\/p>\n

Price tag for the package: $9.5 million. Refundable deposits of $80,000 are already being accepted through an escrow company.<\/p>\n

To put those figures in perspective, space passengers have paid as much as $35 million to take a weeklong trip to the International Space Station on a Russian spacecraft, after spending six months in training. The last such passenger flew in 2009. Since then, NASA has paid more than twice as much for Russian rides to orbit.<\/p>\n

\"Aurora
A cutaway diagram shows the interior of Aurora Station. The module would measure 43.5 feet long and 14.1 feet in diameter. (Orion Span Illustration)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The open questions surrounding Orion Span have to do with funding and logistics.<\/p>\n

Orion Span founder and CEO Frank Bunger told GeekWire that the venture is currently self-funded, with added support from two angel investors whom he declined to name. An investment round is planned in the next two or three months, he said.<\/p>\n

Bunger said the space module for Aurora Station would be assembled in-house in Houston, starting in early to mid-2019, with some components provided by outside suppliers. Software development is being done in the San Francisco Bay Area.<\/p>\n

Orion Span hasn\u2019t yet sealed any deals with partners to send Aurora Station into orbit, or to transport passengers and cargo to and from the station, Bunger said. (For what it\u2019s worth, one of the vehicles shown docked to the station in an artist\u2019s conception looks a lot like a Boeing Starliner.)<\/p>\n

Bunger acknowledged that it\u2019ll take a lot of work to develop, test and launch hardware in time to open the space hotel in 2022. \u201cThe main point is that there are ways to make it move faster,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Prior to founding Orion Span, Bunger worked at a variety of software and IT companies, most recently as vice president for a computer security company called UpGuard. Orion Span\u2019s other executives have had experience in spacecraft design and development.<\/p>\n