They assure that space travel will begin in a few months – 07/15/2018

The two main companies in the field of tourist trips in the space ensure that they are only a few months away from the first, although no d & # 39; Between them do not want to venture on a specific date.

Virgin Galactic founded by billionaire Richard Branson, and Blue Origin the creator of Amazon Jeff Bezos, in competition, using entirely different technologies, to complete their tests and become the first company to offer this service

How will the experience be?

Virgin and Blue passengers will not be in orbit around the Earth, and their experience in weightlessness will only last a few minutes. It's a very different experience than the first space tourists, who paid tens of millions of dollars to get to the International Space Station (ISS) in the 2000s.

Then I pay for a much cheaper ticket – $ 250,000 to Virgin and it is not yet known how much in Blue Origin-, these new space tourists will go into the atmosphere for tens of kilometers before returning to Earth . As a reference, the ISS is in orbit about 400 km from our planet

The goal is to cross this imaginary line where space begins be the Karman line, to 100 km from the surface of the Earth. , or the border that recognizes the US air force, which is 80 km

In the case of Virgin Galactic, six passengers and two pilots is the capacity of the VSS, which has the 39, appearance of a private jet

This unit will be coupled with another spacecraft that accompanies it in its initial course – the WhiteKnightTwo – from which it is separated at a height of about 15 km . Once separated, the VSS starts its propeller and continues on its route

Then, passengers will float in a weightless environment for a few minutes before returning to Earth.

The descent is softened by a system that moves the tail of the ship in a kind of bow before returning to its normal position, begins to plan and ends up landing in the Virgin spaceport in the New Desert -Mexico

The trip lasts between an hour and a half to two hours . During a test conducted May 29 on the Mojave Desert, the spacecraft reached an altitude of 34 kilometers.

First Trials

In October 2014, a Virgin ship failed during the flight due to an error by the pilot and one of the two pilots on board died. The tests then resumed with another vessel

The company reached an agreement for the opening of a second spaceport at Taranto-Grottaglie airport, in the south of 39; Italy

Branson announced in May a BBC program. He hopes to be one of the first passengers in the next 12 months. 650 people are already on the waiting list to make this trip, according to Virgin in AFP

Blue Origin uses technology that looks more like the traditional rocket: the New Shepard.

On this ship, six passengers board a capsule inserted into the point of an 18-meter rocket. After launch, this capsule separates from the rocket and continues its trajectory for several kilometers. During a test on April 29, the capsule has exceeded one hundred kilometers.

After a few minutes of weightlessness, during which passengers can see through large windows, the capsule gradually returns to the Earth helped in its descent by three large parachutes and propellers that slow down the fall.

From take-off to landing the flight took about ten minutes in the last test.

So far, in the tests have only been Rob Meyerson, one of the directors of the company, said that "soon" would begin to do tests with human beings.

Another Blue Origin official, Yu Matsutomi, reported Wednesday that Space News and Boeing are developing their own NASA astronaut transport pods, which will be tested at the end of this year. They should be ready in 2020 after some delays. This is a heavy investment that will likely be partially funded by offering private flights. Source link