For sale: Trips around the Moon
2005-08-11 11:41
New York - The company that pioneered commercial space travel by sending "tourists" up to the International Space Station is planning a new mission: rocketing people around the far side of the Moon.
The price of a round-trip ticket: $100m.
The first mission by Space Adventures could happen in 2008 or 2009 and is planned as a stepping stone to an eventual lunar landing by private citizens.
"For the first time in history, a private company is organising a mission to the Moon," Space Adventures CEO Eric Anderson said at a Manhattan news conference on Wednesday, a day after space shuttle Discovery safely returned to Earth.
"This mission will inspire countries of the world, citizens ... our youth."
Anderson said he already has prospective "private explorers" who are interested in the trip and could afford the ticket.
The initial travellers would be the first to orbit the Moon in more than 33 years, according to the Arlington, Virgnia, company. Only 27 people have ever made such a journey.
"We are going to show the world that private citizens can complete the training and the qualification necessary to execute such flights," Anderson said.
The trip, aboard a modified Russian spacecraft, will offer the chance to see the Earth rise from lunar orbit and a view of the far side of the Moon from an altitude of 100 kilometres.
The far side of the Moon has a special appeal, Anderson told The Associated Press in an interview, because it takes most of the hits from asteroids, meteorites and other objects from deep space. That results in many more craters than on the side seen from Earth.
"It's much more interesting to look at than the near side," he said, adding that the lunar orbits will be done when the far side is illuminated by the Sun.
Space Adventures plans to offer multiple trip itineraries aboard Russia's Soyuz TMA spacecraft. One possibility is a five-and-a-half day lunar flight and up to 21 days at the International Space Station; another is a nine-day mission with three days of free flight in low-Earth orbit and the rest flying around the Moon. In both cases, the spacecraft would dock with a booster, carried up by a separate launch vehicle, to propel it to the Moon.
The Soyuz was originally designed for lunar missions, although none ever occurred. Anderson called it the most reliable craft in the history of space travel.
It has 10 cubic metres of crew space, about the size of a large SUV. The cosmonaut and two passengers will sleep in reclining chairs, said Nikolai Sevastyanov, president of rocket maker Rocket and Space Corporation Energia.
Space Adventures has a partnership with the rocket maker and the Federal Space Agency of the Russian Federation, through which they have sent American businessman Dennis Tito and South African Mark Shuttleworth on a Soyuz for stays on the space station.
On the net:
www.spaceadventures.com
- AP