WEBVTT - Tourists In Spaaaaace! 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:07.240 Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go places. Welcome to 0:00:07.400 --> 0:00:14.960 Forward Thinking. Hey there, everyone, and welcome to Forward Thinking, 0:00:15.040 --> 0:00:17.800 the podcast that looks at the future and says, let 0:00:17.840 --> 0:00:20.680 me see what spring is like on Jupiter and Mars. 0:00:21.000 --> 0:00:26.280 I'm Jonathan Strickland, I'm Lauren Vocabon, and I'm Joe McCormick. So, um, guys, 0:00:26.320 --> 0:00:29.480 I just got back from a great trip. You guys 0:00:29.520 --> 0:00:32.920 held down the fort admirably. I went to c e S, 0:00:33.000 --> 0:00:36.000 which it was cool, but it did really immediately made 0:00:36.000 --> 0:00:38.519 me wish that I could take a vacation because it's 0:00:38.560 --> 0:00:41.199 a lot of work to cover c e S and uh, 0:00:41.240 --> 0:00:43.839 you know, I like exotic vacations. And that's where this 0:00:43.920 --> 0:00:47.280 whole space thing sort of popped into mind, this idea 0:00:47.360 --> 0:00:50.800 of let me really really get away from it all. 0:00:50.840 --> 0:00:53.559 Although I'm kind of curious here, I mean, because you 0:00:53.560 --> 0:00:57.120 you may have expressed a few, um frustrations with the 0:00:57.120 --> 0:00:58.960 amount of preparation that you had to do to go 0:00:59.040 --> 0:01:01.360 to ce ES and the amount of preparation to go 0:01:01.400 --> 0:01:03.720 to space is like six months of training. Yeah, but 0:01:03.840 --> 0:01:07.840 you know I can sleep through that. That's easy enough. So, yeah, 0:01:07.880 --> 0:01:10.959 we wanted to talk about space tourism, this idea of 0:01:11.240 --> 0:01:14.880 regular human beings going up into space, people who are 0:01:15.040 --> 0:01:20.000 not necessarily dedicating a significant portion of their lives to 0:01:20.360 --> 0:01:24.000 the study of space or the exploration of space, people 0:01:24.120 --> 0:01:26.920 who just want to have a chance to experience that 0:01:27.000 --> 0:01:30.800 for themselves. You know, I can imagine back in the 0:01:30.840 --> 0:01:34.679 sixties when people were watching the Apollo program on TV. 0:01:35.840 --> 0:01:38.840 There was probably this sense among children at the time 0:01:38.880 --> 0:01:43.679 that like, oh man, the doors, yeah, they're just flying open. 0:01:44.120 --> 0:01:46.600 In a few years, I'm going to be going to space. 0:01:46.720 --> 0:01:48.920 We're going to go there on vacation. It'll be fun. 0:01:49.040 --> 0:01:50.760 It'll be like a day trip. You know, you can 0:01:50.840 --> 0:01:52.880 just go up and look at the curve of the 0:01:52.920 --> 0:01:56.240 Earth at the window. Wouldn't that be cool? Well, particularly 0:01:56.280 --> 0:01:58.760 once we started landing people on the Moon, and at 0:01:58.800 --> 0:02:02.480 that point I really thinking, okay, so now now this 0:02:02.560 --> 0:02:04.520 is the future. This is it from here on out. 0:02:04.600 --> 0:02:06.840 We're not going to have a time where we're not 0:02:06.960 --> 0:02:09.760 going to the moon. And that time came pretty quickly. 0:02:10.120 --> 0:02:13.040 Then we never went back, unless you believe that Apollo 0:02:13.120 --> 0:02:16.760 eighteen movie. I have seen that Apollo eighteen movie. Don't 0:02:16.760 --> 0:02:21.640 watch it. I'll save you. Uh. It's terrible, is absolutely terrible, 0:02:24.560 --> 0:02:26.960 not not even a little bit. What's it about like 0:02:27.040 --> 0:02:31.639 moon spiders or about Moon rock spiders or rock moon 0:02:31.720 --> 0:02:36.280 spider episode to ask conspiracy stuff about? But yeah, yeah right, yeah, 0:02:36.320 --> 0:02:38.560 Well okay, so we never we didn't go back to 0:02:38.560 --> 0:02:42.560 the Moon. We're still going to space some Yeah, we've 0:02:42.600 --> 0:02:47.080 got the International Space Station. We've got some telescopes up 0:02:47.080 --> 0:02:49.520 there and a couple that are well one in particular 0:02:49.639 --> 0:02:53.239 that's getting ready for the big launch. So we keep 0:02:53.240 --> 0:02:56.200 talking about that wacky like Mars one kind of thing. Yeah, 0:02:56.400 --> 0:02:59.000 we'll talk more about that too. Yeah. But but I 0:02:59.000 --> 0:03:00.440 think I think that I s S right now is 0:03:00.480 --> 0:03:03.320 pretty much the inspiration. I mean, kids like Chris Hadfield 0:03:03.360 --> 0:03:06.880 being up there and and you know, singing space audity 0:03:06.919 --> 0:03:10.080 and getting people excited about the entire thing all over again. 0:03:10.120 --> 0:03:12.560 You know, it's He's very much I think our generations 0:03:12.600 --> 0:03:16.240 answered to those terrific Apollo videos. Yeah, it's great to 0:03:16.360 --> 0:03:20.040 be a space enthusiast. But if you are not somebody 0:03:20.040 --> 0:03:22.480 who works at NASSA, if you're not like a test 0:03:22.560 --> 0:03:25.200 pilot or an astronaut of some kind, how are you 0:03:25.200 --> 0:03:28.440 going to get there? Well, I mean, until fairly recently, 0:03:28.440 --> 0:03:33.480 you could get there by dropping a tunnel cash. Yeah yeah, okay, 0:03:33.520 --> 0:03:37.400 so this requires a little bit of explanation. So, uh, 0:03:37.640 --> 0:03:39.960 a little bit more than a decade ago, you know, 0:03:40.000 --> 0:03:42.960 about fourteen years ago or so, the world was in 0:03:43.240 --> 0:03:47.280 a space where the Russian Space Agency in general in 0:03:47.280 --> 0:03:49.720 general was really strapped for cash. In fact, Russia in 0:03:49.760 --> 0:03:53.720 general was really strapped for cash, right, and uh, you know, 0:03:53.760 --> 0:03:57.760 the Russians have a space an actual space industry, just 0:03:57.840 --> 0:04:00.640 like the United States does. And then a lot of 0:04:00.680 --> 0:04:03.840 the US space industry depends heavily on the Russians at 0:04:03.840 --> 0:04:07.840 this point for their various rockets and some of the 0:04:07.880 --> 0:04:10.480 other equipment they make as well, and of course their 0:04:10.520 --> 0:04:14.280 their partners aboard the International Space Station. So back at 0:04:14.320 --> 0:04:17.200 that time there was a company called Mere Core m 0:04:17.200 --> 0:04:19.960 I R c O r P. So they were in 0:04:20.080 --> 0:04:22.200 charge at that time of private company in charge of 0:04:22.240 --> 0:04:26.240 the Mere Space Station, and they were looking at perhaps 0:04:26.360 --> 0:04:29.680 offsetting some of the maintenance costs of the Mirror by 0:04:29.760 --> 0:04:33.200 offering up the chance for private citizens to spend a 0:04:33.240 --> 0:04:36.680 hefty lump of cash in order to go up and 0:04:36.760 --> 0:04:40.320 visit the mirror, uh space station. This was great while 0:04:40.360 --> 0:04:43.080 the Mirror was still you know, in orbit. Yeah, so 0:04:43.440 --> 0:04:46.560 a couple of things happened. Well. For first, there were 0:04:46.640 --> 0:04:49.960 some companies that took advantage of being able to send 0:04:49.960 --> 0:04:52.720 people up into space. But they're not space tourists, right. 0:04:52.760 --> 0:04:56.560 These were companies that sent along a specialist who was 0:04:56.800 --> 0:04:59.800 someone who would oversee the payload of like something that 0:04:59.839 --> 0:05:03.400 wasn the Space Shuttle or in one case, there was 0:05:03.640 --> 0:05:07.440 a reporter for the Tokyo Broadcast System called toyo Hiro 0:05:07.600 --> 0:05:12.000 Akiyama who went up to the Mere Space Station once 0:05:12.080 --> 0:05:15.480 this program was offered, and it was actually the Tokyo 0:05:15.520 --> 0:05:19.520 Broadcasting System that paid the twenty eight million dollars US 0:05:20.000 --> 0:05:23.960 to the Russian space industry for Akayama to go up 0:05:24.000 --> 0:05:29.000 there and broadcast. And Akayama actually performed science experiments broadcast 0:05:29.040 --> 0:05:31.839 every single day. So this was a working trip. It 0:05:31.960 --> 0:05:36.039 was not a vacation, right, So so we don't really 0:05:36.080 --> 0:05:38.880 count that as a space tourist, but it's sort of 0:05:39.120 --> 0:05:43.240 opening up the doors for what immediately followed. So there's 0:05:43.240 --> 0:05:47.719 a guy named Dennis Tito. He was yeah, American businessman, 0:05:47.960 --> 0:05:53.640 um really wealthy investor and um he is officially the 0:05:53.720 --> 0:05:57.640 first person to pay a fee to go up into space. Now, 0:05:57.680 --> 0:06:01.279 initially his plan was also to go up and visit Mirror. 0:06:01.760 --> 0:06:04.800 But like you were alluding to, Lauren, mir did not 0:06:05.000 --> 0:06:08.640 stay up in orbit forever. They Russian Space Agency actually 0:06:08.720 --> 0:06:12.400 decided to de orbit Mirror. De orbit means let it 0:06:12.520 --> 0:06:18.640 crash into, yeah, onto Earth. So he began to Actually 0:06:18.680 --> 0:06:21.520 what happened was a Mirror Corps began to partner with 0:06:21.560 --> 0:06:25.080 another company, a company that becomes really big in space tourism, 0:06:25.320 --> 0:06:28.560 company called this U space company called Space Adventures Limited, 0:06:29.960 --> 0:06:32.719 which I thought was like a laser tag company until 0:06:32.720 --> 0:06:34.760 I looked more into this, But no, it's this. This 0:06:34.800 --> 0:06:37.880 is actually the organization that coordinates with say, the Russian 0:06:37.880 --> 0:06:40.920 Space Agency to make sure people can go up into space. 0:06:41.200 --> 0:06:43.400 I kind of want them to also do laser tag. 0:06:43.480 --> 0:06:45.280 That might be part of the training. I don't know. 0:06:45.640 --> 0:06:47.640 You never know, you might run into space aliens and 0:06:47.680 --> 0:06:49.520 you have to make sure your accuracy is really high 0:06:49.520 --> 0:06:52.680 moon spiders and spiders. Am I correct in saying that 0:06:52.760 --> 0:06:55.360 all of the people, all of the space tourists so 0:06:55.400 --> 0:06:57.359 far who have been up there, have been with Space 0:06:57.360 --> 0:07:01.560 Adventures if you don't count Akayama, absolutely, and and we 0:07:01.560 --> 0:07:03.920 shouldn't count Ocama because again that was a business trip, 0:07:04.080 --> 0:07:08.360 not us. So yes, you are correct and so and 0:07:08.400 --> 0:07:10.800 also we should say that all of these trips so 0:07:10.920 --> 0:07:14.520 far are orbital trips. You're reaching orbital velocity, you're actually 0:07:14.600 --> 0:07:17.240 orbiting the Earth, as opposed to suborbital, which we'll talk 0:07:17.280 --> 0:07:20.480 about a little bit later. So Tito goes up there, 0:07:21.080 --> 0:07:25.680 spends probably Space Adventures does not share how much money 0:07:25.800 --> 0:07:27.880 each person spent in order to get there, and the 0:07:28.640 --> 0:07:32.240 amount of money changes depending upon when and how the 0:07:32.240 --> 0:07:34.480 person goes up and how long they go up. But 0:07:34.880 --> 0:07:37.640 people like to speculate on how much these trips costs. 0:07:37.680 --> 0:07:41.760 So the the estimation is roughly around twenty million dollars 0:07:41.920 --> 0:07:45.160 US to go up there. And he went up for 0:07:45.600 --> 0:07:48.640 a week essentially. And uh, and what happened with Space 0:07:48.640 --> 0:07:50.880 Adventures was able to when I say up there, I 0:07:50.920 --> 0:07:53.080 don't think I've actually mentioned where he went. The International 0:07:53.080 --> 0:07:55.680 Space Station is where he went. So because mirror was 0:07:55.720 --> 0:07:58.800 no longer an option, the I S S became the 0:07:58.800 --> 0:08:01.800 the one location and you could go to, and Space 0:08:01.800 --> 0:08:04.960 Adventures was able to secure that. At the time, NASA 0:08:05.400 --> 0:08:08.320 not so thrilled with this option. They felt that the 0:08:08.320 --> 0:08:11.440 I S S was really a scientific facility and that 0:08:11.520 --> 0:08:16.400 to bring tourists in would jeopardize actual legitimate science, not 0:08:16.440 --> 0:08:19.880 to mention devalue the whole concept of what the I 0:08:20.080 --> 0:08:22.960 S S was. They were also not at the US 0:08:23.080 --> 0:08:25.480 and Russia. We're not really having the best of relations 0:08:25.640 --> 0:08:27.720 right that very momentary that they had just had that 0:08:27.840 --> 0:08:31.239 espionage scandal, and uh, the US had kicked a bunch 0:08:31.320 --> 0:08:34.200 of foreign dignitaries out of out of our country, and 0:08:34.320 --> 0:08:37.520 Russia had, in exchange kicked a bunch of our dignitaries 0:08:37.559 --> 0:08:40.920 and their country. Everyone was pretty pretty upset with everybody else. 0:08:41.200 --> 0:08:44.679 Russia was threatening to defund their portion of the I 0:08:44.840 --> 0:08:47.000 S S entirely. Yeah, it was. It was kind of 0:08:47.040 --> 0:08:49.840 a you know, I'm not gonna lie, a little shaky time. 0:08:49.960 --> 0:08:53.120 It was. But I actually think that this tourism thing 0:08:53.240 --> 0:08:56.520 might have brought everyone together with the promise of money 0:08:57.000 --> 0:08:59.880 could have So yeah, he went up and spent a 0:09:00.000 --> 0:09:03.319 week there and then came back down and uh and 0:09:03.320 --> 0:09:07.079 and set the president. And since then, um, I believe 0:09:07.240 --> 0:09:09.240 six other people have gone up. I can tell you 0:09:09.280 --> 0:09:12.480 their names actually, so there's there's Mark Shuttleworth was the 0:09:12.480 --> 0:09:16.360 next one. He was a businessman from South Africa, paid 0:09:16.400 --> 0:09:18.760 also probably around twenty million dollars. He went up in 0:09:18.760 --> 0:09:20.920 two thousand two, spent eleven days up on the I 0:09:21.120 --> 0:09:24.760 S S. Gregory Olsen paid about twenty million in two 0:09:24.800 --> 0:09:28.719 thousand five from October one to October eleven. Then you 0:09:28.800 --> 0:09:33.040 had Annoche and and sorry, she paid around twenty million 0:09:33.040 --> 0:09:36.000 and two thousand six for a little over a week 0:09:36.240 --> 0:09:39.480 in September. She was an Iranian American who who is 0:09:39.520 --> 0:09:42.600 a telecommunications entrepreneur and the first woman to to go 0:09:42.720 --> 0:09:45.559 up as a space tourist. And she she blogged all 0:09:45.559 --> 0:09:48.160 of her experiences about it. And the blog is still 0:09:48.240 --> 0:09:50.520 up and it gives me so many feelings. I highly 0:09:50.520 --> 0:09:52.400 recommend that everyone go check that out. I'll see if 0:09:52.400 --> 0:09:54.720 I can remember to link it on social. Next, we 0:09:54.800 --> 0:09:58.600 have Charles Simoni, who went twice. He liked it so 0:09:58.679 --> 0:10:01.880 much he went a secon at time. He went in 0:10:01.920 --> 0:10:04.160 two thousand seven for fifteen days, and in two thousand 0:10:04.240 --> 0:10:07.760 nine he went up again for fourteen days. And estimates 0:10:07.760 --> 0:10:10.000 say they paid around twenty five million for the first 0:10:10.120 --> 0:10:12.520 privilege and around thirty five million for the second one. 0:10:12.559 --> 0:10:14.920 And you might wonder, hey, how's this dude to afford 0:10:15.000 --> 0:10:19.000 all these crazy vacations. Well, he's the guy who essentially 0:10:19.040 --> 0:10:22.800 oversaw the production of a little uh software suite called 0:10:22.840 --> 0:10:26.320 Microsoft Office. Oh yeah, so no big And so if 0:10:26.320 --> 0:10:29.720 you've ever used word or excel or in power Point, 0:10:30.000 --> 0:10:35.200 this is the guy using it twice. Yeah. So he's 0:10:35.240 --> 0:10:37.840 worth around a billion dollars so that, you know, not 0:10:38.120 --> 0:10:41.559 insignificant sum of money, but he could afford it. Next 0:10:41.720 --> 0:10:44.760 is the guy who I actually know who went to 0:10:44.800 --> 0:10:48.480 the International Space Station, Richard Garriott. Richard Garriott a k a. 0:10:48.600 --> 0:10:51.400 Lord British. He's the guy who created the ultimate series 0:10:51.440 --> 0:10:54.439 of computer role playing games. Uh and someone I met 0:10:54.480 --> 0:10:56.719 when I was a kid and stayed in contact with 0:10:56.800 --> 0:10:58.840 him for quite a few years. I've lost touch with him. 0:10:59.080 --> 0:11:01.880 I have not really talked about his experiences in space. 0:11:02.400 --> 0:11:05.200 He's a busy man, so I don't have any firsthand 0:11:05.640 --> 0:11:08.360 or even secondhand information to give you. Someday we are 0:11:08.360 --> 0:11:10.200 going to do a text up episode about him. But 0:11:10.240 --> 0:11:13.920 the final person we've got on here he Lallaberte. He's 0:11:13.960 --> 0:11:16.680 a Canadian, so it's probably actually guy at this point. 0:11:17.760 --> 0:11:19.240 I guess it all depends on whether or not you're 0:11:19.240 --> 0:11:24.360 in Quebec. But La Liberty Thank You went up in 0:11:24.400 --> 0:11:27.280 two thousand nine. He paid probably right around forty million 0:11:27.280 --> 0:11:30.959 dollars to do so, and uh, he comes from he 0:11:31.240 --> 0:11:34.120 got his money from a little show, got a little 0:11:34.120 --> 0:11:36.600 bit of popularities, particularly if you've been to say, Las 0:11:36.679 --> 0:11:40.520 Vegas recently starked to La where I think every show 0:11:40.600 --> 0:11:42.960 in Vegas has now starked to lay. So did he 0:11:43.040 --> 0:11:46.280 get to do acrobatics and eat fire and space? I 0:11:46.280 --> 0:11:48.960 would say no to the fire, and you're kind of 0:11:49.000 --> 0:11:53.079 have to do acrobatics when you're up there, because yeah, 0:11:53.320 --> 0:11:56.360 walking is would be an amazing trick up in space. 0:11:56.440 --> 0:11:58.880 So I bet he did it. He probably did, He 0:11:58.920 --> 0:12:03.120 probably did. Those were the the that's officially the list 0:12:03.200 --> 0:12:07.200 of people who have been to space as quote unquote tourists, 0:12:07.240 --> 0:12:09.920 although I should say that most of them hate that 0:12:09.960 --> 0:12:13.400 word because they actually did stuff up there as opposed 0:12:13.440 --> 0:12:15.800 to just going on a vacation. I think the technical 0:12:15.920 --> 0:12:19.080 term might be private astronaut, private astronaized what some of 0:12:19.120 --> 0:12:21.560 them like, Yeah, there were a couple, there were some 0:12:22.240 --> 0:12:27.720 one one person said something like uh uh, private space traveler. 0:12:27.880 --> 0:12:30.080 Like it was just there were all these different little 0:12:30.200 --> 0:12:32.800 variations on it, because no one really wanted it to 0:12:32.840 --> 0:12:37.959 just be tourist, doctor space love doctor, doctor space guy. Yeah, yeah, 0:12:38.080 --> 0:12:40.760 it would just be the last one. And sorry also 0:12:40.880 --> 0:12:42.800 pointed out that, you know, she was like, I spent 0:12:42.880 --> 0:12:45.200 like six months training for this guy's It's not It's 0:12:45.200 --> 0:12:47.360 not like I was just like, oh, hey, space trip, 0:12:47.920 --> 0:12:54.240 Like I didn't book an all inclusive package, you know, yeah, exactly. So, Uh, 0:12:54.559 --> 0:12:58.599 you know, the trips are pretty serious stuff, right, I 0:12:58.640 --> 0:13:00.360 mean you have to go through lots of a Now, 0:13:00.400 --> 0:13:04.760 granted it depends upon which agency are looking at, you know, 0:13:04.800 --> 0:13:07.160 how they do this, but you know, they had to 0:13:07.240 --> 0:13:10.680 do training to learn everything from how the various systems 0:13:10.720 --> 0:13:13.679 work so they could operate any given system. They had 0:13:13.720 --> 0:13:16.040 to know how to react in the case of an emergency. 0:13:17.320 --> 0:13:20.240 They had to seem at least healthy enough that they 0:13:20.280 --> 0:13:23.800 could take that trip without either causing themselves injury or 0:13:23.920 --> 0:13:26.600 making someone else sick. Okay, well, let's talk about the 0:13:26.640 --> 0:13:30.400 different kinds of private space travel that are available. First 0:13:30.400 --> 0:13:33.480 of all, like, what technically counts his space? How high 0:13:33.480 --> 0:13:36.240 do you have to go? Well, the United States says 0:13:36.280 --> 0:13:39.040 that you have to go about eighty kilometers up or 0:13:39.080 --> 0:13:43.840 fifty miles, but that's not that it's also not the 0:13:43.880 --> 0:13:48.400 only definition. I mean, the the Federation Aeronautique INTERNATIONALE sets 0:13:48.400 --> 0:13:51.840 the altitude at one kilometers, which is around sixty two 0:13:51.880 --> 0:13:54.760 miles high. It's just because it's a round number in 0:13:54.800 --> 0:13:57.600 the metrics system. What do they know? Whereas whereas the 0:13:57.679 --> 0:14:00.680 fifty miles is a round number and the see we 0:14:02.000 --> 0:14:08.160 that okay, I see all right, size America? Um okay, 0:14:08.160 --> 0:14:11.600 So yeah, space it doesn't have a there's not like 0:14:11.640 --> 0:14:14.200 a specific border, right that you can just point out 0:14:14.240 --> 0:14:17.040 and say, on this side you are not in space, 0:14:17.080 --> 0:14:18.959 and on this side you are in space. It's kind 0:14:18.960 --> 0:14:20.640 of more of a it's kind of a more of 0:14:20.680 --> 0:14:24.840 a wibbly wobbly spectrum thing. Yeah, so it all depends 0:14:24.920 --> 0:14:28.600 upon your point of view. I guess. Also another thing 0:14:28.640 --> 0:14:30.200 we should point out is, you know, like I said 0:14:30.240 --> 0:14:32.720 that these are all orbital space trips. You know, they 0:14:32.720 --> 0:14:35.040 were in orbit around the Earth. You're talking as a 0:14:35.240 --> 0:14:38.000 tourist who have already gone. That's the only thing that 0:14:38.200 --> 0:14:43.320 had been available was orbital. There were no suborbital specific 0:14:43.720 --> 0:14:47.440 missions for for space tourism. Okay, well, let's talk about 0:14:47.800 --> 0:14:50.400 let's sort of go from the bottom to the top. 0:14:50.680 --> 0:14:53.880 So suborbital is less than what these people who already 0:14:53.880 --> 0:14:57.040 went did. What is it? Okay, suborbital. It's it's not 0:14:57.120 --> 0:15:01.360 necessarily an altitude thing. It's more of a speed thing. Okay, 0:15:01.360 --> 0:15:03.400 So in order to be in orbit, you have to 0:15:03.440 --> 0:15:06.400 attain orbital velocity. That means you're going at a speed 0:15:06.400 --> 0:15:10.080 where you are constantly uh, the your fall towards the 0:15:10.120 --> 0:15:14.040 Earth is at the same same rate as the curvature 0:15:14.160 --> 0:15:16.560 of the Earth, in the sense that you're always falling 0:15:16.600 --> 0:15:18.800 just beyond where the Earth is. You're staying in that 0:15:18.880 --> 0:15:23.400 same relative point um. Not necessarily in geosynchronous or geostationary orbit, 0:15:23.440 --> 0:15:26.280 but you know that's you're you're going at this incredible speed, 0:15:26.640 --> 0:15:28.640 so you have to maintain that speed in order to 0:15:28.640 --> 0:15:32.080 maintain orbit. If you drop below that speed, then you're 0:15:32.120 --> 0:15:34.320 going to start falling toward the surface of the Earth. 0:15:34.400 --> 0:15:37.560 That's what's a suborbital trip. So if you were to 0:15:37.600 --> 0:15:39.240 go fast enough so that you got up to the 0:15:39.280 --> 0:15:41.680 altitude where more or less you argue that, yes, I'm 0:15:41.720 --> 0:15:44.320 in space, I'm a h kilometers up or I'm you know, 0:15:44.360 --> 0:15:48.200 eighty kilometers up, depending upon whose definition you're following. Uh, 0:15:48.240 --> 0:15:50.200 But your speed is not so much that you're going 0:15:50.240 --> 0:15:53.440 to stay in orbit. That would be suborbital. So again 0:15:53.480 --> 0:15:55.240 it's not so much an altitude thing as is a 0:15:55.280 --> 0:15:59.000 speed thing. It does mean that it's slightly I hesitate 0:15:59.040 --> 0:16:02.240 to use the word easy, but it's something that's more 0:16:02.320 --> 0:16:05.080 achievable if you are able to design the right kind 0:16:05.080 --> 0:16:08.400 of aircraft for it. Um And that's really what a 0:16:08.440 --> 0:16:12.160 lot of the space tourism companies out there are looking 0:16:12.200 --> 0:16:16.360 at is the suborbital orbital option also would mean that 0:16:16.480 --> 0:16:20.440 the uh, the cost of putting someone up there would 0:16:20.440 --> 0:16:23.920 be lower, so you would see lower price tags attached 0:16:23.920 --> 0:16:26.960 to those tickets than say twenty to fifty million dollars 0:16:26.960 --> 0:16:30.200 per pop, which I think we mostly can argue is 0:16:30.320 --> 0:16:34.280 not within the grasp of your average tourist, right, most 0:16:34.320 --> 0:16:36.840 consumers can't really drop that kind of cash. And we'll 0:16:36.840 --> 0:16:40.160 cover more of that in another episode about the costs 0:16:40.320 --> 0:16:43.160 of space travel and how could this actually come into 0:16:43.240 --> 0:16:47.320 the grasp of the average traveler. So when we talk 0:16:47.360 --> 0:16:50.040 about suborbital right now, we have to talk about all right, 0:16:50.080 --> 0:16:54.080 who who? Who is offering up a suborbital travel plan? 0:16:54.280 --> 0:17:02.080 Richie Branson? Right, Well, eventually to two companies are have 0:17:02.200 --> 0:17:05.199 solid plans in place. Yeah, So that that's something we 0:17:05.240 --> 0:17:07.480 definitely need to stress though. Is that no one's doing 0:17:07.480 --> 0:17:11.080 it yet. But when you say solid, what you mean 0:17:11.240 --> 0:17:13.520 is like you can go to their website and start 0:17:13.560 --> 0:17:16.399 booking right now. Sure, I could also book lots of 0:17:16.440 --> 0:17:18.679 trips to fictional places. I'm not going to get there 0:17:18.680 --> 0:17:21.640 anytime soon. You can, And well, I mean, I think 0:17:21.640 --> 0:17:23.800 that the way that I'm defining it is that they 0:17:23.880 --> 0:17:26.959 are capable of doing at least a test flight with 0:17:27.000 --> 0:17:29.600 the equipment that they currently had right there. In fact, 0:17:29.600 --> 0:17:33.000 there was a test flight of Virgin Galactics aircraft that 0:17:33.040 --> 0:17:37.000 they're planning on using for suborbital trips just a few 0:17:37.040 --> 0:17:39.560 days before the recording of this podcast. We're recording this 0:17:39.840 --> 0:17:43.720 on January four, two thousand and fourteen, and on January tenth, 0:17:44.160 --> 0:17:46.840 they held a test flight and it was really to 0:17:46.920 --> 0:17:50.080 check out the rocket control system. So this was the 0:17:50.119 --> 0:17:53.520 first time they had had an actual, live human pilot 0:17:53.600 --> 0:17:56.720 behind the controls to test this to make sure it worked, 0:17:56.720 --> 0:18:00.240 and everything worked perfectly, So it's a great story. However, 0:18:00.280 --> 0:18:03.520 you should also remember the first time Richard Brentson talked 0:18:03.520 --> 0:18:06.000 about Virgin Galactic was back in two thousand four and 0:18:06.040 --> 0:18:08.159 at the time he was projecting out to have the 0:18:08.240 --> 0:18:12.679 first flights taking travelers to a suborbital pathway to be 0:18:12.720 --> 0:18:16.280 in two thousand seven. So you know, we've gone a 0:18:16.400 --> 0:18:20.320 decade since he announced this essentially more or less, and 0:18:20.359 --> 0:18:23.720 we have not yet hit that first flight. And it's 0:18:23.960 --> 0:18:26.439 you know, it tells you a couple of things that 0:18:26.520 --> 0:18:30.919 these these tasks are way more complex and uh and 0:18:31.080 --> 0:18:34.439 more expensive than people had anticipated when they first started 0:18:34.480 --> 0:18:37.919 thinking about it. Getting into space is not a trivial matter. 0:18:38.160 --> 0:18:41.160 So um, it's not to say that this is impossible 0:18:41.280 --> 0:18:44.800 or we shouldn't pursue it, but rather that by by 0:18:44.840 --> 0:18:48.199 seeing how far off we were from the projections, we 0:18:48.240 --> 0:18:50.200 have to keep that in mind. And I've actually seen 0:18:50.280 --> 0:18:53.760 some people suggest that fourteen might be the make or 0:18:53.840 --> 0:18:57.920 break year if we don't see uh, some some um 0:18:58.080 --> 0:19:04.040 market success from these these unit these different companies that 0:19:04.080 --> 0:19:06.720 are trying to have this, that it might end up 0:19:07.119 --> 0:19:09.880 pulling some of the enthusiasm out. We're going to start 0:19:09.880 --> 0:19:13.960 getting disillusion right. Um yeah, Okay, So let's take a 0:19:13.960 --> 0:19:17.400 look at these companies like Virgin Galactic and SpaceX who 0:19:17.400 --> 0:19:20.280 want to offer suborbital flights. What does this flight actually 0:19:20.320 --> 0:19:23.320 look like? What happens on it while you go up 0:19:23.359 --> 0:19:27.439 into the again, depending upon what the altitude is you 0:19:27.480 --> 0:19:31.000 go up into space, but again at a speed, at 0:19:31.040 --> 0:19:33.600 a speed where you are not going to go into orbit, 0:19:33.640 --> 0:19:35.679 but you will have at least a few minutes of 0:19:35.680 --> 0:19:39.600 weightlessness as well as the opportunity to view stars without 0:19:39.640 --> 0:19:41.600 any sort of twinkling, because you're not gonna have any 0:19:41.640 --> 0:19:43.800 atmosphere in the way, So you're gonna see the stars 0:19:43.880 --> 0:19:46.119 as they would appear if you were out even further 0:19:46.200 --> 0:19:48.399 into space. Uh, you're gonna have a great view of 0:19:48.400 --> 0:19:51.200 the Earth. You can be able to see the curvature exactly. Yeah, 0:19:51.200 --> 0:19:52.640 you'll be able to see the curvature of the Earth. 0:19:53.160 --> 0:19:57.360 And Uh. Also, because you would be traveling in a 0:19:57.400 --> 0:20:01.240 fully pressurized cabin, you would not necessarily have to wear 0:20:01.280 --> 0:20:04.560 a full space suit. Um, this would be something where 0:20:04.560 --> 0:20:06.560 you might be wearing a jumpsuit, but not a full 0:20:06.560 --> 0:20:09.800 space suit. The whole trip would last ninety minutes from 0:20:10.000 --> 0:20:12.879 take off to landing, so only a few minutes of 0:20:12.880 --> 0:20:16.080 those would be spent in quote unquote space. But you 0:20:16.080 --> 0:20:19.160 would have that opportunity to be in an environment that 0:20:19.600 --> 0:20:24.440 relatively few people have experienced. Yeah, so you get a 0:20:24.480 --> 0:20:28.680 pretty unique and amazing view. You get to experience some weightlessness, yep. 0:20:29.359 --> 0:20:31.800 There's a lot of other companies working on this besides 0:20:31.880 --> 0:20:35.280 Virgin Galactic and space X. Two that are kind of 0:20:35.320 --> 0:20:38.719 interesting are Blue Origin, which is a fairly secretive company. 0:20:39.119 --> 0:20:42.560 That one was founded by Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon. 0:20:42.760 --> 0:20:44.320 So if you figure out what to deal with them 0:20:44.400 --> 0:20:47.600 is uh, well, they're looking at vertical takeoff and landing 0:20:47.680 --> 0:20:49.720 rockets that can be used over and over again, so 0:20:49.720 --> 0:20:51.600 it's a slightly different approach. A lot of these other 0:20:51.640 --> 0:20:55.280 spacecraft are craft that would be launched from another aircraft, 0:20:55.800 --> 0:20:57.840 so they kind of piggyback onto an aircraft and then 0:20:57.920 --> 0:20:59.840 launch while they're already in the air so that they've 0:20:59.840 --> 0:21:03.239 are he got that initial boost going, um but in 0:21:03.280 --> 0:21:05.280 this case it would be a rocket. Blue Origins looking 0:21:05.280 --> 0:21:07.359 at rockets that would take off from the service of 0:21:07.400 --> 0:21:11.359 the Earth and then returned to the service of the Earth. Um. So, 0:21:11.640 --> 0:21:13.600 but they're pretty quiet about the whole thing. And then 0:21:13.640 --> 0:21:16.600 there's x Core Aerospace, which is also looking into spacecraft. 0:21:16.640 --> 0:21:19.040 There a lot of their early work was mostly in rockets, 0:21:19.080 --> 0:21:21.800 actually building the rockets that would take a spacecraft up 0:21:21.840 --> 0:21:24.600 into space, but they're now working on the craft itself. 0:21:24.720 --> 0:21:29.000 I love that Virgin Galactics is called the enterprise. That's 0:21:29.000 --> 0:21:33.240 great V S S enterprise. It's based off Spaceship two, 0:21:33.640 --> 0:21:35.880 which in term was based off Spaceship one. You might 0:21:35.960 --> 0:21:38.920 guys might remember that was the spaceship that actually won 0:21:38.960 --> 0:21:43.240 the d Sorry X prize for achieving suborbital flight. It 0:21:43.320 --> 0:21:47.360 was unmanned, but it achieved the flight, won the ten 0:21:47.400 --> 0:21:51.880 million dollars and was immediately retired. And Sorry X, by 0:21:51.880 --> 0:21:55.159 the way, being funded by our our friend and sorry 0:21:55.240 --> 0:21:58.320 who was one of the six who went up into space. 0:21:58.840 --> 0:22:01.919