A Concept for Space Tourism
- Paper number
IAC-05-E5.P.10
- Author
Ms. Anna Schubert, Technical University of Berlin, Germany
- Year
2005
- Abstract
The idea of travelling into space, of experiencing microgravity and viewing the earth from a distance is receiving more and more attention from the broad public as space technology improves and the desires of travel adventures increase. An opportunity to make such an experience seems no longer like a dream or the exceptional job of astronauts but has become quite realistic also to private people. The last few years brought enormous breakthroughs in the field of suborbital flight for tourist passengers and continuing this development, it will soon be possible to bring tourists into space regularly, providing several days of orbital time rather than just 15 minutes of weightlessness. During a student project at the Technical University of Berlin an ambitious concept to make orbital space tourism possible and affordable within the next years has been developed. After a research on existing and currently developing launchers and space stations, market surveys and methods of space planning and management, the most suitable components have been combined as a base for the concept. Because of the already existing or far developed components and easy comparisons, a realistic time schedule could be created and cost estimation could be conducted. The result is a concept that enables around 50 to 100 passengers per day to travel to a space station in the Low Earth Orbit and stay in the space hotel for a week for a price of less than 300,000 US$. The further detailed scenario can act as a motivation and inspiration for travel agencies to go beyond their current offers and provide the access to space for paying customers, that do not necessarily have to be multi-millionaires. Given the high demand for space tourism and the existing and continuously improving state of space technology, this study shows that the realization of a project of this kind may only be a few years away.
- Abstract document