Most of the trips we make are to other points in the Earth’s crust, where gravity holds us, but the trips upwards, towards the stratosphere, are getting closer and closer to our reach.
When we think about traveling our trajectories are generally more or less horizontal on the Earth’s surface. We traveled by car avoiding rivers and mountains. At best, we fly by plane, which after a few minutes of ascent maintains a trajectory parallel to the surface for most of the flight. We rarely travel up.
So far, there are just over 500 humans who have traveled to space. For the trip to be worthwhile, you must reach an altitude of 100 km above the Earth’s surface, according to the FAI (Fédération aéronautique internationale), also called the Kármán line.
That was precisely the height reached by William Shatner, the lovable actor who played Captain Kirk in Star Trek, as he flew past aboard the rocket launched by Blue Origin, the aerospace company of Jeff Bezos. Touched, Shatner, who is 90 years old, declared as he landed: “Seeing the color blue pass you by, and now you’re looking into the darkness…everybody needs to do that. Everyone needs to see this.”
The blue origin capsule
Bezos’ company is selling tickets to the space on your website who can pay them, and although the ticket price has not been revealed, it is known that so far they have raised close to 100 million dollars.
Another millionaire, Richard Branson, has his own space transport company, galactic virgin. Unlike Bezos’ rocket or SpaceX equivalents, Elon Musk’s company Virgin Galactic employs modified, manned, and winged planes. Tickets for this ticket cost US$450,000, but the price reduction has its counterparts. The flight only reaches about 82 kilometers high, so it’s not technically reaching space, something Branson has hotly contested.
Virgin Galactic rocket plane
Why go on a rocket if there are balloons
The prohibitive prices of space travel and its possible transformative effect on people’s consciousness have led to the search for more modest and affordable alternatives. World View Enterprises is developing a balloon-capsule system to offer travel into the stratosphere.
In this case, you will fly aboard a pressurized capsule that will be transported by a giant helium balloon. First trips are planned for 2024 and tickets will sell for $50,000 per seat. However, the capsule will only reach an altitude of 30 km above the Earth’s surface. It’s not technically a trip to space, but it’s enough to get a view of the Earth’s curvature against the backdrop of space.
Each trip will last between six and twelve hours. The company plans to release 3,000 balloons a year that can only be used once. The balloons will be recycled to be used as products that will benefit communities near the launch site. On the way back to Earth, the capsule will descend by means of a kind of GPS-guided paraglider that will allow it to land in a precise location.
World View plans to launch the capsule from seven locations around the world, including the Northern Lights in Norway, the Grand Canyon in the United States and the Great Barrier Reef. With this, the total duration of the experience will be five days. The capsule will have onboard video cameras that will capture the entire journey. It will also have telescopes to be able to get up close and see both the Earth’s surface and the stars. There will be a variety of food options and Wi-Fi connectivity.
The space craze managed to reduce the price of travel, the biggest obstacle, tenfold in a few years. space travel low cost they are getting closer every day.