Sic itur ad astra.

Our goal is to provide you with the most incredible experience of your life.

-Virgin Galactic brochure.

"Now that's cool!"

Glen Williams

Recently one of my co-workers came up to me and said that although he didn't blog himself*, if he did blog, he'd want to write about being able to get into space for $200,000.

I don't normally take requests (although I'm happy to take submissions) but I was intrigued enough by Glen's obvious enthusiasm and interest that I decided to do a little research and find out about what we'll charitably call "affordable" space travel.

* * *

Imagine for a moment a hot summer day in New Mexico.  The only sound is that of sand being sifted onto baking hot tarmac by a dry desert wind.

Then ... a glint of sunlight on metal, far, far away in the azure sky ... a low droning hum that builds into a roar as a vee-winged bullet blasts down from the sky to scream along the runway before coming to a reluctant halt.

Welcome to space travel, Virgin Galactic style.

Or, at least, welcome to the idea of space travel.  So far millionaire entrepreneur Richard Branson hasn't announced a specific date for the first commercial flight out of his newly christened Spaceport America in New Mexico.  However, he's confident that he and his two children will be able to participate in the maiden voyage of VG's new SpaceShipTwo (appropriately named the VSS Enterprise) before the end of 2012.

Over 475 people are equally confident, to the point of having paid the required $20,000 deposit, or in many cases the full $200,000 ticket price, to experience three days of astronaut training, a two-and-a-half hour trip to the fringes of space, and five minutes of free fall. 

To be honest, my initial response to all of this was to be offended.  Being able to buy a ticket to space somehow trivialized the Holy Grail of space flight for me, like selling pieces of the True Cross.  But after some thought, I've decided that this is very likely the best thing that could have happened to our moribund** exploration of space.

After all, this post isn't really about being able to travel into space, it's about the fact that someone thought it was cool.  I think it's been a long time since the man on the street really felt that way about space travel, and it's gratifying to discover that almost 500 people think it's cool enough to drop close to a quarter of a million dollars for the opportunity to free themselves from gravity for five minutes.

Logic says that this is how it will start. We live in a society where people pay to travel, and stay in hotels, and eat meals, and so on, and other people compete to offer those things as services.  Right now two other companies are working on developing similar strategies for space tourism, and if interest and demand continues to grow, we'll start to see another space race developing, but this time the goal will be to offer people "the most incredible experience of their life".  Virgin Galactic is just offering a suborbital experience - next it will be orbital, then to the Moon, then Mars...

So, everyone, here's an idea.  There must be some way to set up a lottery legally, and right now I'm getting about the right number of hits a month for 2,000 tickets at a hundred dollars a shot.  Hey, Glen - interested in paying a hundred bucks for a one-in-two-thousand chance at space?  Get lucky, and you could find yourself sitting on a runway with five other people, ready to lift off from Planet Earth.

Now that would be cool.

- Sid

* You may wish to imagine this as somewhat in the style of the Most Interesting Man in the World commercials:  "I don't blog, but when I do, I get Sid to do it for me."

** http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/moribund - I'm sorry, but it's the right word to use!!