SpaceAdventures

Google Cofounder To Become Space Tourist

Google co-founder Sergey Brin has announced he'll be join the ranks of the ultra-wealthy booking a space flight. Brin's date with the sky will be in 2011 when he will be one of the passengers aboard Russian Soyuz rocket. Brin has put down a $5 million deposit with Space Adventures, a company which has already sent five tourists into space for $20 to $35 million each. Brin is the first of six founding members of an "Orbital Mission Explorers Circle" who will each contribute $5 million to pay for the company to launch its first private mission to the International Space Station. Visitors to the space station may be allowed to take their own space experiments with them.

Google has previously demonstrated an interest in space travel, funding the Google Lunar X Prize, a $25 million competition to get a spacecraft to the moon.

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Space Adventures Plans An Arab Emirates Spaceport

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Wings

We mentioned Space Adventures earlier for their new partnership with Prodea but they have also announced plans for a commercial spaceport in Ras Al-Khaimah in the United Arab Emirates as part of a plan for global spaceports in various locations. The total cost of the global spaceport development project is at least $265 million. The UAE spaceport will be located less than an hour drive from Dubai (perfect for all those luxury tourists). The development schedule hasn't been released yet.

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Tags: space adventures, space tourism, SpaceAdventures, SpaceTourism, tourism, united arab emirates

Space Tourism News Update

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Wings

Space tourism is getting bigger and bigger. Space Adventures, which was the first company to run commercial orbital space flight, has signed up with Prodea, a private investment firm that sponsored the Ansari X prize, to develop a fleet of suborbital spaceflight vehicles for commercial use globally. The goal of the venture is to create turnkey space tourism systems involving the delivery of suborbital launch vehicles to multiple global locations. The Explorer will take up to five people to space.

Also in space news, Aero-News Network reports that the New Mexico legislature has approved $110 million for the new spaceport that may be the hub of U.S. space tourism.

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Tags: orbital flight, space adventures, space port, space tourism, SpaceAdventures, suborbital flight