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Commercial trips to space by 2011
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A dream could come true for wealthy tourists by 2011. A spacecraft designed for them was unveiled on Monday. Backers of the venture hope it will signal a new era in aviation history.
200-thousand US dollars. That's what you'll have to pay for a 2-hour flights to space including about five minutes of weightlessness.
SpaceShipTwo has been bankrolled by British billionaire Sir Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Galactic.
Branson says some 300 clients have already paid for a ticket or put down the deposit.
Sir Richard Branson, Vigin Galactic Founder, said, "It is perhaps surprising that it is so difficult to get people into space but I think it's worth remembering that NASA has spent (b) billions and billions and billions of dollars on space travel and they've only actually sent 480 people into space in the last 60 or 70 years. And we're hoping and planning to literally send thousands of people into space over the next coming years."
Branson teamed up with famed aviation designer Burt Rutan, the brains behind the venture.
SpaceShipTwo is based on Rutan's design of a stubby white prototype called SpaceShipOne.
As the first privately manned craft to reach space, SpaceshipOne was designed for 3 people. The new model is twice as large and can carry six passengers and two pilots.
Sir Richard Branson, Vigin Galactic Founder, said, "We want to build a spaceship that is 100 percent safe, that gives people a return ticket, that gives people an incredible experience. And we don't want to be rushed in doing it. I mean it's taken us 5 years to get to this stage. I think it'll take us maybe anything up to 2 years of solid thorough tests."
But believe it or not Branson has competitors. A handful of entrepreneurs including Amazon Chief Executive Jeff Bezos are building their own suborbital rockets with dreams of flying people out of the atmosphere.
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