THE first private space station crew was introduced Tuesday: Three men who are each paying $55 million to fly on a SpaceX rocket.
They’ll be led by a former Nasa astronaut now working for Axiom Space, the Houston company that arranged the trip for next January.
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This is the first private flight to the International Space Station. Its never been done before,” said Axiom’s chief executive and president Mike Suffredini, a former space station program manager for Nasa.
“While mission commander Michael Lopez-Alegria is well known in space circles, the other three guys are just people who want to be able to go to space, and we’re providing that opportunity,” Suffredini said.
The first crew will spend eight days at the space station.
They will take one or two days to get there aboard a SpaceX Dragon capsule following liftoff from Cape Canaveral.
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Russia has been in the off-the-planet tourism business for years, selling rides to the International Space Station since 2001.
Other space companies like Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin plan to take paying customers on up-and-down flights lasting just minutes.
These trips, which are much more affordable with seats going for hundreds of thousands versus millions, could kick off this year.
Axiom’s first customers include Larry Connor, a real estate and tech entrepreneur from Dayton, Ohio, Canadian financier Mark Pathy and Israeli businessman Eytan Stibbe, a close friend of Israel’s first astronaut Ilan Ramon, who was killed in the space shuttle Columbia accident in 2003.
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“These guys are all very involved and doing it for kind of for the betterment of their communities and countries,” Suffredini said.
“We couldn’t be happier with this makeup of the first crew because of their drive and their interest.”
Each of these first paying customers intends to perform science research in orbit, he said, along with educational outreach.
Lopez-Alegria, a former space station resident and spacewalking leader, called the group a collection of pioneers.”
What is the ISS?
Here’s what you need to know about the International Space Station…
- The International Space Station, often abbreviated to ISS, is a large space craft that orbits Earth and houses astronauts who go up there to complete scientific missions
- Many countries worked together to build it and they work together to use it
- It is made up of many pieces, which astronauts had to send up individually on rockets and put together from 1998 to 2000
- Ever since the year 2000, people have lived on the ISS
- Nasa uses the station to learn about living and working in space
- It is approximately 250 miles above Earth and orbits around the planet just like a satellite
- Living inside the ISS is said to be like living inside a big house with five bedrooms, two bathrooms, a gym, lots of science labs and a big bay window for viewing Earth
Tom Cruise was mentioned last year as a potential crew member; NASA top officials confirmed he was interested in filming a movie at the space station.
There was no word Tuesday on whether Cruise will catch the next Axiom flight. Suffredini declined to comment.
Each of the private astronauts had to pass medical tests and will get 15 weeks of training, according to Suffredini.
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The 70-year-old Connor will become the second-oldest person to fly in space, after John Glenn’s shuttle flight in 1998 at age 77. He’ll also serve under Lopez-Alegria as the capsule pilot.
Axiom plans about two private missions a year to the space station.
It also is working to launch its own live-in compartments to the station beginning in 2024.
This section would be detached from the station once it’s retired by Nasa and the international partners, and become its own private outpost.
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In other news, Nasa last month unveiled the brave astronauts who will head to the Moon in 2024.
Human cremated ashes are to be sent to the Moon next year as part of a commercial burial service piggybacking on a Nasa lunar mission.
And, wars could be settled in space in the future, a top RAF chief has warned.
What do you make of Axiom’s plans? Let us know in the comments…
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This post first appeared on Thesun.co.uk
