Recently, Blue Origin, the aerospace company owned by Jeff Bezos of Amazon, announced that it had chosen 82-year-old Walky Funk, a female aerospace pioneer, to rocket into space on its first passenger flight on July 20. She will not only be one of the passengers on board this crewed flight, but also the oldest to travel to space. Bezos, his brother Mark, and the winner of a charity auction (who has bid $28 million for a seat on this New Shepard flight) will be her co-passengers.
BBefore this, Virgin Galactic founder Richard Branson had scheduled a short up-and-down flight along with three others to suborbital space on July 11.
But why are these space flights talked about a lot?
Space tourism
Space tourism is nothing but people travelling to space for fun or recreational purposes. Astronauts have been travelling to space since the 1960s to perform planets. If you are wondering whether Funk and team would be the first space tourists, the answer is “no”. American multi-millionaire Dennis Tito was the first space tourist. He is said to have paid $20 million for hitching a ride alongside trained cosmonauts on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft to the International Space Station in the year 2001. What is distinct about the Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin flights is this is the first time private companies are attempting to send private individuals to space. The objective is to make space travel accessible to civilians. But whether space tourism will be within our reach, considering the exorbitant price involved for the experience, is debatable. However, these are just early days.
Besides Bezos’ Blue Origin and Branson’s Virgin Galactic, Elon Musk’s SpaceX is keen on ushering in a new era of private commercial space travel, wherein people will be transported on short, suborbital flights to the edge of space.
Suborbital flights
Suborbital flights ascend about 100 km above the Earth to let travellers experience a few minutes in space. They also enable travellers to experience weightlessness and to catch a glimpse of the planet’s curvature through viewing windows before returning to Earth. A suborbital flight does not have the power or speed to achieve orbit. SpaceX, which already transports astronauts to actual orbit and to the International Space Station, plans an all-civilian mission to space later this year.
Picture Credit : Google
