Marking a New Era of Human Voyages to Space

The half-century push to carry humans and cargo to space, initially funded by governments and enabled by investments and ingenuity of space sector visionaries, is here at last. What are the returns for both space tourism and space stations under development? And how do we ensure the final frontier remains accessible to everyone, not just the ultra-wealthy?

Laura Forczyk, owner of space consulting firm Astralytical and author of “Becoming Off-Worldly,” which features interviews with former astronauts to better prepare future citizen astronauts, notes that two things happened since 2020 that have propelled the market forward – first, SpaceX gained the capability to launch people into space, and second, Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin’s progress with suborbital spaceflight.

She cautioned that one gating factor remains: the high price tag of space travel.

“Spaceflight is expensive and human spaceflight is even more expensive. A very limited number of people can fly right now, but that will scale up in the future.” She cites SpaceX’s Starship vehicle and the modular design of new commercial space stations as examples of how space travel will scale in the future. Starship is currently in development and designed to carry hundreds of passengers to Earth orbit, the Moon, Mars, and beyond.

No one can dispute that high-net-worth individuals are getting the first rides to space. Space billionaires Sir Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos, led the way, riding on their respective capsules in 2021. This past April, Axiom-1, the first all-private tourism mission, rocketed to the International Space Station (ISS) on a SpaceX Crew Dragon, carrying four passengers, three of whom paid $55 million apiece for their roundtrip ticket.

Harkening back to the earliest days of air travel, serial space entrepreneur Jason Andrews says it’s not surprising that the wealthy will be the first to experience space tourism, as that was the case as well when passenger air travel began in the 1920s.

“The 2020 decade will be the same as the 1920s, when air travel was for the rich. They traveled in first class luxury accommodations, and it wasn’t for the general masses. That’s what we’re going to see in the 2020s for space travel. It’s going to be for the rich. But that’s okay because if we can’t get the rich flown, we’ll never get to the masse,” he says.

Andrews and other experts agree that space travel will become the norm sooner than people realize, with space tourism serving as a way “to open the door commercially for this industry to thrive. I've always had this mindset that it was just a matter of when not if.”

Andrews is focused on bringing space tourism to reality. The former founder of Spaceflight Industries and BlackSky currently leads Orbite, established in 2019 to train private citizens for space travel from a physical, mental, and spiritual capacity.

“Our observation was you have all these people investing billions of dollars to build this amazing infrastructure, but no one's really focused on the passengers. How do you train and equip this next generation of space travelers? It's not only people that are going for pleasure, but it's also people going there for their profession,” Andrews says.

Andrews’ current venture, Orbite, offers astronaut training, from entry-level astronaut orientation that educates the public on the industry to help create “educated buyers,” to more advanced space experiences that help prepare travelers for suborbital and orbital space travel. Courses range from a few hours and a few hundred dollars to multiple weeks that can cost over $100,000.

“We're trying to build a pipeline of pre-screened, pre-qualified customers who are ready to go to space. That's what the industry needs,” he says.

He recalls in 1995 when NASA commissioned market studies on the commercial market opportunity for space, the agency identified three areas of greatest promise: a Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) business park, nuclear waste disposal on the moon, and space tourism.

Twenty-seven years later, interest and investment in the space sector has accelerated to hyper speed. Rob Meyerson, founder and CEO of aerospace and technology management consulting firm Delalune Space, observes, “There's something in space tourism for all sorts of ranges or levels of affordability.”

Meyerson explains that people can begin to enjoy space tourism without leaving the ground by visiting a space museum or a NASA visitor center to attend a launch.

Space enthusiasts can also participate in high-performance airplane flights from companies like Zero-G Experience, where people can experience weightlessness on a specially modified Boeing 727 G-Force One aircraft that flies aerobatic maneuvers called parabolas. Coming soon are zero-pressure balloon rides from firms like Space Perspective and World View that allow tourists to hover 100,000 feet above the Earth’s surface before returning to Earth over a two-hour return voyage. The more costly adventures are suborbital trips from firms such as Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic, followed by orbital flights from SpaceX and, eventually, trips to orbital destinations from Axiom Space.

Both World View and Space Perspective are taking reservations for balloon-operated spacecraft that will allow passengers to glide up to the stratosphere in luxurious cabins and enjoy the view before a slow return to the ground. World View plans to offer scenic landings in the wonders of the world – such as Amazonia, Brazil, the Giza Pyramids in Egypt and the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. According to Phil Wocken, director of marketing, first commercial flights are scheduled to begin in early 2024 out of World View’s first spaceport near the Grand Canyon.

Space Perspective expects to begin commercial flights in late 2024. In April, the company unveiled a customizable Space Lounge interior with comfortable lounge chairs, mood lighting, Wi-Fi and a fully stocked bar. The company stated it offers the only carbon-neutral zero-emission way to visit the edge of space via a unique SpaceBalloon connected to the capsule.

“Our offer is about advancing a better appreciation of planet Earth and the interconnectedness of the human race,” states Space Perspective founder and CEO Jane Poynter, who said the 360-degree panoramic windows will be the largest-ever flown to space, providing a view 450 miles in any direction.

Space Perspective is putting emphasis on hospitality and user experience, bringing on experience curator David Grutman, a leader in the hospitality field, known for creating immersive experiences for restaurants, hotels, and nightclubs. Poynter says the views “will be even more magical when layered with David’s flair for hospitality and entertainment.”

Reusability & Reaching the Masses: Starship

Experts agree that reusable spacecraft – rockets capable of repeated orbit and landing — are key to making space an option for the masses. SpaceX’s orbital launch systems are being developed for reuse, including the boosters on the Falcon 9, which are regularly landed for repeat launches. SpaceX’s huge Starship rocket, designed for eventual trips to the moon and Mars, is a fully reusable spacecraft built to carry more than 100 metric tons of cargo and crew per launch. SpaceX founder Elon Musk has described Spaceship as key to efficient, large-scale orbital space travel.

For space entrepreneurs like Orbite founder Andrews, Musk’s vision for Spaceship signaled the feasibility of a large-scale space travel market. The market is developing quicker than those in the industry expected, he says.

“I don't think people fully appreciate how revolutionary Starship is,” notes Andrews, explaining that once he and co-founder Nicolas Gaume, fully understood SpaceX’s vision behind Starship, they felt propelled to launch their professional astronaut training program.

“That's when we said, ‘We have to found this company and go as fast as possible,’” he recalls.

Orbite is currently building an astronaut training facility that will leverage everything NASA has pioneered over 60 years but adapting it to a clientele who aren’t professional astronauts. The company emphasizes physical as well as mental and spiritual preparation.

“You can just talk to anyone who's been on Blue recently, especially William Shatner, it is overwhelming. The Overview Effect [the shift in awareness that results from viewing Earth from orbit or the moon] is real,” he says.

Another entrepreneur, Jared Isaacman, founder of payment processing company Shift4, made history this past September piloting the first private spaceflight to orbit the Earth comprised of all nonprofessional astronauts. The mission, called Inspiration4, raised $240 million for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

“We were immensely fortunate to have the opportunity to train at SpaceX and ultimately undertake a successful mission to orbit and back,” Isaacman says. “Hopefully, we showed that space doesn’t need to remain the exclusive domain of governments, but that we can open the door for a better future while also working to address some of the real hardships of the day.”

He agrees that the key to opening spaceflight to the masses is reusability.

“[Reusable spacecraft] drive down costs to ultimately make space more accessible for people, for science and research and more,” states Isaacman.

The billionaire credits the two decades of hard work by SpaceX to build a highly reusable spacecraft system with the significant momentum the world is seeing for space travel. He is now preparing for the first of three missions under a new partnership with SpaceX called the Polaris Program, established to demonstrate new technology that will culminate with the first crewed launch of Starship. Polaris Dawn’s first launch is slated for no earlier than November 2022 and will include the first Crew Dragon spacewalk.

“Starship can be the 737 for human spaceflight and truly make humankind a spacefaring civilization,” says Isaacman, who hopes “to further humanity to become interplanetary.”

He applauds the progress Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic has made in the last year with suborbital flights but observed that both companies still need to scale if they hope to achieve an affordable price point that would be accessible to the public.

Space Travel Demand Outstrips Supply

During the space tourism and space station panel at SATELLITE 2022 in March, the two suborbital competitors reported strong bookings: An auction for an open seat on Blue Origin’s first passenger spaceflight last July drew a winning bid of $28 million. The company has since completed four missions, including one carrying Star Trek’s original Captain Kirk, actor William Shatner. Blue Origin’s flight time is 11 minutes, while Virgin Galactic’s spaceship’s flight duration is approximately 90 minutes, but passengers on both vehicles spend less than 5 minutes in space.

“The industry can’t keep up with demand right now,” said panelist Ariane Cornell, vice president of Commercial & International Sales for Blue Origin. She says Blue Origin has generated $100 million in sales with a strong pipeline of interested and confirmed reservations for future flights.

As of April 25, 750 people have made spaceflight reservations for Virgin Galactic’s piloted flights, in which a spaceplane is launched mid-air from a carrier plane.

Panelist Sirisha Bandla, vice president of Government Affairs for Virgin Galactic, who became the second woman born in India to fly to space on Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo in July 2021, emphasized that missions that include science missions and commercial activities in space will help lower the barrier to entry for space access by “allowing a wider swath of users in the market to access space at a much lower cost.”

“We're seeing a lot of the consumers that want to use suborbital to test technologies and do R&D for orbital missions that are much longer duration. We're seeing that pipeline starting to form,” she said. “Those people I truly believe are not going to be one-time users; they are going to fly other vehicles.”

In a follow-up interview with Via Satellite, Cornell explains that Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket is fully automated, and the company is working to make flights more routine. “Every penny New Shepard makes goes back into the program to lower the cost and increase the cadence of flights.”

Cornell notes that while New Shepard was designed to open the suborbital space tourism and research markets, it was also built for another purpose—“to learn how to make human spaceflight routine, safe and low cost, so we can use the effectively limitless resources of space for the benefit of Earth.”

She adds that the experience Blue Origin is gaining on New Shepard gives the team confidence they will be successful with the New Glenn, Blue Origin’s two-stage orbital reusable launch vehicle.

“By having a suborbital vehicle built to fly people from the beginning, you can gain experience with many of the techniques and technologies needed for orbital human flight, but at a far lower cost, at a faster flight rate, and in a larger market,” she says.

The timing of New Glenn’s launch won’t occur before 2023, Jarrett Jones, senior vice president of the New Glenn program, stated during SATELLITE 2022.

Expanding Access and Accessibility

Many entrepreneurs want to ensure that space is accessible to everyone, with efforts ranging from a new global reality-TV program to initiatives to champion disability inclusion in space and contests to inspire more girls to pursue space careers.

Space Hero will be launching a biennial competition series where the winning contestant will receive a 10-day trip to the ISS valued at $55 million, the largest prize ever awarded on a reality TV show. The only qualification to enter? Applicants must be at least 18 and speak English ― “the language of space,” says Space Hero Co-founder Deborah Sass. “The barrier to entry is very, very low. It has to be because if you're going to be a multiplanetary species, everybody has to be able to go.”

“As spaceflight becomes the norm and financially and situationally accessible, it's going to have to be accessible to everyone,” agrees Eric Ingram, founder and CEO of Scout, Inc.

Ingram was one of 12 disability ambassadors for AstroAccess, an organization dedicated to disability inclusion in space exploration. Along with collaborator Zero Gravity Corporation, AstroAccess kicked off a campaign that hopes to inspire a space era that includes disabled astronauts.

Ingram and the other ambassadors took a zero-gravity flight this past October to understand how spacesuits and space vessels can be more user-friendly and accessible to people with mobility, hearing, and vision disabilities.

“I’ve used a wheelchair my entire life and this was a completely novel, transformative experience,” recalls Ingram, who also points to a financial reason for the space industry to focus on accessibility issues. “Some 15 percent of the world's population has some form of a disability. If they don't feel welcome, or able to experience whatever product you're providing, that's 15 percent of the possible market share you're automatically missing out on,” he says.

The Space Prize Foundation, started by the founders of Space VIP, an elite travel agency, is another group looking to expand access to space to middle and high school girls who remain under-represented in the space industry. According to the United Nations, only one in five space industry workers are women. Of the 566 people who have been to space, only 11.5 percent have been female, while women collectively account for about 20 percent of the space industry.

“That leaves a lot of kids feeling like it's not for them or they're not a part of it or it's going to be hard for them. We're trying to improve those statistics,” notes Mark Wagner, the foundation’s president.

After a successful New York City school pilot, the foundation will launch a Global Space Prize Challenge this June open to 15- to 18-year-old women worldwide. Thirty finalists will all work with mentors and experience a Zero G flight and two grand prize winners will fly on an upcoming Space Perspective launch.

Predicting the Future

So, what will space tourism traffic look like by 2030 and beyond?

“In 10 years, there's going to be one or more private space stations in Low-Earth Orbit. We're already going to have more competitive sources for the launch of people and cargo,” predicts Meyerson, who foresees multiple research and manufacturing platforms. He also points to the Artemis program spurring more exploration of the Moon, “further enabled by competing landers and transportation services.”

Space Perspective’s Poynter says, “Within the next 10 years we will see routine spaceflight operations and thousands of people visiting space. In the same way that people in the early days of air travel and computers could not imagine how they would soon affect all our lives, so, too, we cannot yet imagine the immense impact space travel will have on society in the coming years.”

Andrews says it wouldn’t surprise him if Musk’s Spaceship makes it to Mars by 2030, but not necessarily crewed by humans, but “definitely” by 2040.

Isaacman doesn’t think space tourism should extend to orbital missions given the inherent risks and training required for those longer duration trips but he expressed confidence that the economics will fall into place to create a vibrant space economy.

“As costs continue to come down and there are more paths to orbit, more and more people will journey to orbit and try and accomplish important things. I believe people will be working in space as opposed to just visiting it,” he concludes. VS