Luxuries in space

steve smyth lynn ma — Sat, 03 Nov 2007 02:41:59 GMT

I read the exact same story in Popular Science...fifty years ago...different players...different prices...better Artist Conceptions...but, alas...here we still sit...
unless... http://www.smythspace.tv/info.html
an entirely new approach...

Luxuries in space

Frank Glover rocheter, NY — Sat, 03 Nov 2007 16:23:37 GMT

Before the inevitable critics who will oppose the fact that only 'the wealthy,' whatever that exactly is, can do this, I submit that to be logical and consistent, you must also oppose any other form of high-end, expensive travel experience (luxury cruise ships, for example), including the jobs of all those involved (who will generally not be 'wealthy' themselves) inmaintaining the service, or manufacturing the transportation systems themselves (Cadillacs and Lincons are built by the same assembly line workers as low-end cars) and all the income and sales taxes so derived...

Luxuries in space

CM Modesto CA — Sun, 04 Nov 2007 02:43:42 GMT

I'm not opposed to it because it caters to the ultra-rich. I predict it will eventually fail because it relies on the fickle "ultra-luxury" market. The SST Concorde failed due to high operating costs and limited markets, and space tourism has far higher costs and a far more limited market.

Luxuries in space

Kenny Parsons, Berkeley CA — Sun, 04 Nov 2007 05:47:16 GMT

"for fear of tipping off its competition at Virgin Galactic."

Now that's a laugh. Since when is Rocketplane a serious competitor to Virgin Galactic? VG = fully funded, massively competent, and two actual manned spaceflights of concept vehicle. RG = been around forever trying to scrounge funding, neglected and abandoned by RpK management, and little or no hardware progress or even tests to speak of in nearly a decade. They're not a serious firm, and it is unlikely they will ever fly.

Luxuries in space

jack in norman oklahoma — Sun, 04 Nov 2007 15:44:49 GMT

Rocketplane needs to stop putting out press releases and
just actually do the work they signed up for. They are already being
sued for breach of contract by Abercrombie and Kent their marketing
partner, they have had fallings out with founders, partners such
as space adventures, Orbital Sciences, etc.....

The investors have seen Zero Return on Investment [...]

Luxuries in space

steve smyth lynn ma — Sun, 04 Nov 2007 16:44:03 GMT

I was just thinking about this...how good is the New Mexico deal gonna look to Branson if Algore becomes President?...that's why the deal is going so slowly...they're stalling until the dust settles...not only is Algore creating the future on Earth, he's working with Branson to do the same for Outer Space...neat trick, eh?
The SpacePort deal...struck at the last minute by Will Whitehorn...his words...not mine...with NM stinks, and without Virgin, Upham's a rail road track in the desert...pay attention, Kids!
I'd watch those two like...like...well, you know what I mean...don't let 'em out of your sight...

Luxuries in space

Yoda — Sun, 04 Nov 2007 17:51:21 GMT

The Future, hard to predict, it is.

Luxuries in space

SRS, North Las Vegas, NV — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 01:15:52 GMT

Kenny, In light of the 3 killed and 3 severely injured in recent ground testing, I wouldn't use your phrase "massively competent" in a description of "VG". And as far as the "two manned spaceflights", those certainly were no where near what one would call a commercial passenger prototype flights. They were very fortunate that they didn't lose the pilot's lives. How those flights qualified for the X-Prize is beyond me. On the face of it, they didn't quite make the rules as published, in several areas.

Luxuries in space

Skip Nicholson, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 14:34:54 GMT

Oh for heaven's sake. Wake up and smell the coffee!
It was less than 100 years from the Wright Brothers' first wobbly flight at Kitty Hawk in what amounted to a box kite made of fabric and wood to the first Concorde flight! Imagine from these first stumbling and tentative steps what the next 100 years will bring. Ok, so we don't have the Starship Enterprise ready for space tourism and exploration, yet. Given humanities past track record, I believe we're on our way and it's only a matter of time.

Luxuries in space

Joshua J. Froiland — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 15:47:00 GMT

People should not be so negative when it comes to others achieving dreams. To strive for one's dream, which in this case is to allow people the incredible opportunity to visit a place that most people have thought they would never get to see; space. It is only logical that if the technology exists, and the money is there, somebody will do whatever they set out to do. I for one am impressed with how far man has come in the past 100 years. From being stuck on the face of the Earth, to very close to making space vacations possible. Its incredible. We should feel blessed to be this far. History has proven time and time again, that people with dreams, and the motivation to do what it takes, achieve what they set out to do, no matter how impossible it seems. Rome, ancient Egypt, Chinese, Wright Brothers... All these and countless more have achieved goals far beyond what seems possible, or at least seemed impossible at the time. Five hundred years from now, who knows what will be. Maybe we will look back at now, as we now look back at the 1500s. How did they survive in such primitive conditions? Just like a broom, where single brissle cannot accomplish any task, a multitude of brissles can achieve great things, in a shorter amount of time. If we work together, great things we can achieve. So ask yourself, are you helping the advance of human knowledge and expansion? Will history look back at our time as as a time of great advancement, or as a time where petty differences and opinions prevented man from doing what they could to better themselves? I for one, will do whats needed.

Luxuries in space

Todd, Billerica, MA — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 15:56:18 GMT

I think there is enough interest in the suborbital adventure flight for 5-10 years of fligts which will bide time for the point to point flights to be tested and draw interest.

The point to point flights will be key to the market since at first it will be wealthy people only, but eventually they will add some cargo. Delivering packages from California to Europe in say 3 hours. That could definitely draw interest. It could draw parallels to the days of early aviation where wealthy passengers paided for the adventure of flight, the quick travel time, and where the market took advantage of this by adding cargo to these flights to deliver mail quickly. This then drove the prices down where more and more people could experience flight, and it could work for suborbital point-to-point as well.

The next couple of years will be key to this whole thing as the market is developing.

Luxuries in space

Matt Falk, Mesa, AZ — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 20:34:01 GMT

CM in Modesto, one major difference between this and the Concorde, is that the building of the Concorde itself was the primary goal. There was never all that big of a push for a follow-on vehicle, it was the end to the means. Most of these new space tourism and rocket-development companies seem to be looking at their projects as a stepping-stone towards bigger and better things. Hopefully things won't stall out before that point, but only time will tell...

Luxuries in space

Frank glover Rochester, NY — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 22:01:06 GMT

"How those flights qualified for the X-Prize is beyond me. On the face of it, they didn't quite make the rules as published, in several areas."

Can you specify? That's what hyperlinking is for...

Luxuries in space

Guy S. Newell — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 22:56:25 GMT

There was a time when only wealthy people could afford automobiles, or to fly in a commercial aircraft, or eat meat every day for that matter. Or bathe more than once a year. There was a time when only wealthy people could expect to live much past 50. So what?

Luxuries in space

Generalist, Spokane WA — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 23:29:18 GMT

"How those flights qualified for the X-Prize is beyond me. On the face of it, they didn't quite make the rules as published, in several areas."

I seem to recall that one set of rules was a two week turn around time. The fact the Scaled did it within less than a week might be considered a 'violation' of the rules.

I also seem to recall that the flights had to carry three people into space in the allotted time. The fact that Scaled had a pilot and weights equivalent to two other bodies on board might be another 'violation'.

These 'violations' didn't prevent the X-Prize officials from awarding the prize. Therefore the rules must have permitted what was done. (Please provide your references SRS of Nevada.)

Do note that the deaths and injuries happened during static testing of a system that had been working well for a while. I half suspect that the test rig or related items may have some sort of flaw. I hope that it isn't a case of sabotage.

But getting back to the primary topic, why anyone would pay $200K for a simple suborbital flight, one need only look back in history to when the barnstormers were going around the country. Even then people would pay a fair amount of money to go up in those new fangled flying machines and return to where they started.

The fact that it costs $200K is a function of inflation and difficulty.

Luxuries in space

steve smyth lynn ma — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 01:33:59 GMT

RE XPrize...I don't have the original XPrize offer page as proof, but have been on the record with them since day one*...you are correct about the 3 people vs. one and some weights...obviously a lot easier to configure the vehicle, when only one life is involved...and much less bad publicity if the worst should happen...
the turnaround thing seems moot...
SpaceShipOne did what it did, XPrize paid...that's really all there is to it.
*I didn't pay the original $1000 entry fee into the Billionaire Boys Club...on principal...it just seemed like the wildest of a bunch of wild schemes afoot, late last century...
good, bad, or otherwise...an entity which I branded bogus a long time ago, sits atop the heap right now...was I wrong, are we in for a sorry surprise?
I hope I was wrong.

Luxuries in space

John, Seattle, WA — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 03:26:41 GMT

A historical note, the only thing that will get a civilian space program going is the selling of luxuries. The reason I say this is that the colonists to the new world with few exceptions were either wealthy or had wealthy backers. A voyage to the new world would be comparable in cost to a trip to the Moon today. The reason they went was not to bring back common food stuffs or bulk goods of any kind, they went for luxuries. The goods that built the new world were sugar, tobaco, cotten, indigo, furs, and anything else Europe found exotic. Space will be reached the same way, find a way to make going to space luxurious or make what you bring back a luxury. The passenger trips will not stay luxuries long but they may last long enough to pay for a ship that can bring back souvenirs from LEO. A point, the problem with the Concord was not that it lost its market but that it never had a real market. The Concord was a government supported project that died when its government got bored with it.

Luxuries in space

JG Bowman, Rock Hill, South Carolina — Thu, 15 May 2008 19:20:19 GMT

Luxuries in space?
Hey if someone has an original idea for a luxury that happens to be used or enjoyed in space (or any other conceivable space luxury, please contact me. Let's talk business!

Luxuries in space

Michael Martin-Smith — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 16:49:56 GMT

Better that the wealthy start the Space revolution than no-one at all!
We face three possible futures in coming generations-
1/neo-Malthusian, "Easter Island"
2/a Green "1984" of totalitarian rule
or 3/ a dispersed human(e) space based civilisation

Option 3 requires cheap and reliable access to Space, and viable space businesses eg tourism and solar power satellites, to name but two
Options 1 & 2 lead inexorably to extinction of civilisation as we know or want it.
Now,increasingly, the Case for Space and the Cause of Liberty are becoming one and the same thing.
If Rocketplane can play a constructive part in this next stage in evolution, then bring on the wealthy, and, in time, the not so wealthy!