By Chris Bradley
Space Adventures is the world’s first space tourism company. They have recently announced that they have plans to organise the first trips around the moon as early as 2015. They have booked the International Space station in order that they can organise rides in the Soyuz spacecraft, which will be adapted to contain double the room before the flights take place.
The spaceship has carried seven passengers into space and was provided by Russia’s Federal Space Agency. The company are planning on charging $150 million per passenger and two passengers will be the maximum amount of people that can be carried at one time.
Space Adventures will train the customers for two months so that they understand the spacecraft and the environment that they will be visiting. This is not the only commercial space company that is interesting investors at the moment, but this is the first company who have booked the space station. They feel that many people have an interest in the moon and that they will be able to provide an extraordinary event for those who decide to take the trip.
It is likely that there will be a lot of people who will be keen to be some of the first to go to outer space; however, as the trips become more popular and the prices start to fall, then they will start to attract more of a mass market which will start to make them a good income. There will be some people that will want to wait until a selection of successful trips have been taken before they decide whether it is for them, but also a selection of risk takers who will get an adrenalin buzz out of the uncertainty.
