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To misquote Bill Clinton’s campaign “it’s the MOON, stupid”, in what probably is one of the most exciting travel news of the recent years, SpaceX founder Elon Musk recently announced that they will be taking two tourists for a slingshot around the moon sometime in 2018.
During a press conference, Musk stated, “We’ve been approached to do a crewed mission beyond the Moon… [and these passengers] are very serious about it.” He confirmed that the company plans to use its Dragon 2 spacecraft for the mission, which will be powered by SpaceX’s Falcon heavy rocket, although one possible fly in the ointment is that the Falcon rocket remains untested, and a year is a blink of an eye when it comes to space travel.
Musk confirmed that the mission will take two private citizens on the trip around the moon. To this date, the two individuals have not been named, and it remains unclear whether they have any experience piloting anything, let alone a spacecraft. Both passengers will obviously have some training beforehand, but SpaceX has not released any details on what the training will involve.
The manned mission will be the culmination of a busy year for the Dragon 2 spacecraft, with SpaceX planning to fly an unmanned mission to the International Space Station by the end of 2017, then a manned mission to the ISS, and finally the manned mission to the Moon.
Although the timeline announced by SpaceX is ambitious, it is noteworthy that its manned mission plans have slipped before, with the company initially planning to start manned missions to the ISS in 2017.
It seems the era of space tourism is fast approaching, with NASA also planning to slingshot tourists around the moon using the Orion capsule mounted on the SLS rocket—although NASA’s plans are still several years away. While SpaceX has received a significant deposit from the two passengers, one can only wonder at the price tag of the ultimate flight, along with how lengthy the liability waiver would be. Either way, those two lucky individuals will have the experience of a lifetime.
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Space Travel is going to be amazing and we in the private Space sector are making it happen!!!
It seems there has to be a third person flying with them – someone who can actually fix problems if problems occur. I understand that they intend to have it fully automated but it’s a long trip and if something goes wrong they would have to learn a lot of stuff in a short period of time and I doubt Youtube will be working there.
We will see if it happens.
Def have to send someone who has a clue. Bound to be hiccups on this adventure. Pretty cool that space tourism is becoming a thing. Sad that only mega wealthy will get a chance.
Exciting, I’d love to go! Hopefully space travel will be commonplace (and reasonably safe) in my lifetime.
I am wondering, how much miles can bring me there aboard?
It will be interesting to see the full details of this venture.
The future of air travel, wonder if we can use points.
Like air travel it will soon be commonplace.
Although I doubt it will be in my time.
What amazes me though is why we have not been back to the moon.
If only we could earn miles and points for that trip!
I bet you’d only earn 5% EQM though 🙁
If it’s even a qualifying flight! You might get a good voucher if you get bumped, though!
LOL
Some of these posts, including Howie’s may have been made in jest. But seems to me that one airline once posted an award for a space flight, for an insane amount of miles. Does anyone else remember that? Maybe that “award” was also a joke?
There is someone who really think that in 2018 (i.e. next year) you can do that?
Maybe you can do that in a science fiction movie!
Hopefully someday this will be accessible and feasible