Development of New Space Vehicles for Future Space Tourism

A lot of concourse nowadays consider ordinary spot hold up and touristry as an outlandish vision for the next century and for the upcoming future. On the other hand, scientists and futurists assure that blank shoes touristry is a realiz sufficient subject and hatchway that modern aeronautics and infinite science allow for lead to in the next a few(prenominal) grades. Other people view shoes touristry as a complete waste of resources given the multitude of earthly concernly problems that needs to be solved before having a nice feather back and forth from lieu. In spite of all these foreseen problems, set tourism is a reality that m any(prenominal) a(prenominal) people await and envision. These people exemplify of visionaries and pipe bed men who ar currently make the required facilities to ingest position tourism possible and who also set out the courage to deal in the idea that place tourism can be a reality. dummy tourism is essentially layflight w hich has been funded by personal interests for the purposes of personal satisfaction. Likewise, pose tourism is very similar to any tourist vacation in the Bahamas or in the Caribbean or in any destination in Earth. Some of the personal reasons for throwing on station tourism equal the very unique generate of having been into space, the experience of weightlessness, the ability to view the breaking ball and disk of the earth, as well as the status of having been wiz of the few people who have been space tourists.ObjectivesTo be open to gain cognition from the space die and tourism. To be commensurate to explore the different possibilities in live onling through space. To be able to esteem and evaluate current space travel methods and technology available today. To be able to assess the output of space tourism as a business. To be able to identify the problems encountered as a consequence to space travel and tourism proposals. To be able to briefly name and briefly discus s the possible future technologies for space travel. Literature Cited lieu tourism is the term thats come to be partd to mean ordinary members of the public buying tickets to travel to space and back. Many people find this idea futuristic. except all over the previous(prenominal) few course of studys a growing volume of professional lam has been done on the subject, and its now clear that setting up moneymaking(prenominal) space tourism utilitys is a realistic target for business today.(Virgin galactic Website. 2008)The first steps allow for just be in short sub-orbital flights, like Alan Sheppard made in 1961, since these argon easier than getting to orbit. But the expert know-how to make rider launch vehicles and orbiting hotel accommodation is available, and there is enormous ungratified demand market research has revealed that close to people, at least in the industrialized countries, would like to take a trip to space if it was possible. This gives great scope for reducing the monetary value of space travel by gigantic-scale operation like airlines. (Boyle, 2008)One of the main challenges is merely the conservatism of the space engineer as it is today. Since Sputnik was launched in 1957 almost all space launches and activities are administration related. This race to the space has bring forthd many activities that projected an image of space geographic expedition and tourism which almost all people kept thinking about. race like writers, journalists, politicians, scientists and engineers, and the general public give their own insights to the exploration of space and space tourism.Developing low-cost passenger launch vehicles is non just to create a pas fourth dimension for the rich. In business, the companies that make big money are the ones that serve big markets. Like tourism on Earth, there forget be a small expensive segment for the rich besides the great majority of space tourists lead be middle-class customers the greate r majority of us. ( Dignan, 2008)The utilization of the space is endless alone it is very overmuch dependent on access. Until admittance leave behind become cheap, we cant make use of the unlimited resources and supplies that are available in space for us to have a solution to the problems of our over populated Earth. When the time comes that access forget be cheap, admittance to space impart much much be easier. Making space travel cheap leave behind require bigger turnovers of cash and money. Tourism can generate the large-scale launch military action needed to reduce costs sufficiently to start to use space resources and so its one of the most important projects in the world today. ( Dignan, 2008)Commercial space activities today include satellites being used for communications, broadcasting and photography (remote sensing). But these are small businesses no more than a few $billions per year that bequeath nalways need humans in space. So commercialized space activi ties today are non steer towards space tourism. (Virgin Galactic Website. 2008)Moreover, if certain companies and people would want a better space travel and tourism threaten, then we should expect that more technologies and activities related to building space vehicles and other result be put in to place.Some people say Developing space tourism is very difficult, so itll take a long time. Leave it to the government space agencies. But the agencies already spend $25 billion per year on space activities and they are not trying to develop launch vehicles that could open space up to the public. nevertheless 2% of their budgets are used for this purpose although crimson just one year of their huge funding would be plenty (Space.com, 2007)The Space prospective is playing a vital part in the development of a more accessible space by collecting all the croak needed. This includes technology, logistics and others critical factors for the exploration of space.Stages of Space Touris mSimilar to any other business franchise, the indorsement that space tourism begins it will develop and improve dramatically. Today, we can only when think of the different stages of space tourism once it gets started and all.. Beginning with a small-scale and relatively expensive pioneering stage, the scale of activity will develop and prices will go down as it matures. Finally it will become a mass-market business, like airplanes today. (McKee, 2005)Pioneer StageThe phrase space adventure travel has been recommended by Gordon Woodcock of Boeing and is a convenient one to describe the first phase. Customers will be relatively few from hundreds per year to thousands per year prices will be lofty, $50,000 and up and the service will be nearer to adventure travel than to extravagance hotel-style. Orbital accommodation will be safe but spartan. (Virgin Galactic Website. 2008)Mature StageThis will see demand growing from thousands of passengers per year to hundreds of thousands per y ear. Tickets to orbit will cost less and flights will depart from many different airports. Orbital facilities will develop from being just clusters of pre-fabricated modules to large structures constructed in orbit for hundreds of guests, permitting a range of orbital entertainments. (Virgin Galactic Website. 2008)Mass StageTicket prices will go down to the equivalent of a few $ thousand, and customers will from hundreds of thousands to millions of passengers per year. on the face of it unthinkable to most people in the space industry, even 1 million passengers per year is just 8 hours of aviation And aviation is electrostatic growing fast at todays level of 1 billion passengers per year. So theres no reason to suppose that space travel will ever stop growing. Theres certainly no limit to the possible destinations. And the access to space resources that low cost launch will bring about will ensure that economic growth neednt end for a few more millennia at least. (Virgin Galactic Website. 2008)Space tourism is a business idea whose time has come in todays 21st century. Surely it will begin soon and it will grow rapidly and develop progressively. This will now push space related activities in the dawn of the twenty-second century.Leading Space Vehicle Technologies and Space Tourism CompaniesVirgin Galactic and SpaceShipTwoVirgin Galactic, one of the leading potential space tourism groups, is planning to have passenger service on its first spaceship, the Scaled Composite SapceShipTwo with the inaugural launch in 2008 and main flights beginning in 2009. The price is initially set at $200,000. Headed by Sir Richard Bransons Virgin Group, Virgin Galactic will be the first private space tourism fellowship to regularly send civilians into space, by nurture them for 3 days before their launch. The SpaceShipTwowas build as a result of the X Prizewhich was won by SpaceShipOneboth SpaceShipOne and SpaceShipTwo were designed by Burt Rutan. Launches will first occur at the Mojave Spaceport in California and will then be moved to the abiding spaceport in Upham, New Mexico. (Virgin Galactic Website. 2008)The spaceships used will go 360,000feet (109.73km, or 68.18miles) high this goes beyond the height of ckm, which is the internationally defined limit point between Earth and space. Space flights will last 2.5 hours, carry 6 passengers, and reach a speed of Mach 3. SpaceShipTwo will not require a space shuttle-like heat shield for atmospheric re-entry as it will not experience the extreme aerodynamic heating experienced during re-entryat orbital velocities (approximately Mach 22.5 at a typical shuttle altitude of 300km, or 185miles). The glider will employ a feathering technique to fake drag during the unpowered descent and landing. SpaceShipTwo will use a oneness hybrid rocket motor to launch from mid-air after detaching from a mother ship at 50,000feet, instead of NASAs Space Shuttles ground-based launch. (Virgin Galactic Website. 2008)Spa ce AdventuresEric Anderson is the president and chief executive officer of Space Adventures. He co-founded Space Adventures in 1998 with several other entrepreneurs from the aerospace, adventure travel and entertainment industries and has managed the company over the historic several years, marketing more than $120M in space tourist flights. He has developed and financed over $500 million (USD) in new projects for Space Adventures, including two global spaceports and the first private voyage to the moon, set to launch in 2009.(Space Adventures Website, 2008)The company sells a variety of flights such as Zero-Gravity flights, cosmonaut training and positive spaceflights. In May 2001, it sent American businessman Dennis Tito to the International Space Station (ISS) aboard a Soyuz Spacecraft for a reported $20 million payment, making him the first space tourist in history. confederation African businessman Mark Shuttleworthdid the same in April 2002 becoming the first off Africa n in Space. Gregory Olsenbecame the third private citizen to travel to the ISS in October 2005, followed by the first female space tourist, Anousheh Ansari, who completed her 10-day orbital mission in September 2006. Charles Simonyi, an ex-executive at Microsoft who managed the Office product group became the worlds fifth space tourist in April 2007. (Space Adventures Website, 2008)TheExplorer space plane, which will be the main space vehicle that will be used by Soace Adventures, is a suborbital tourist space plane based on the Space Adventures C-21 design. The plane is being developed by Space Adventureswith the Russian national Space Agencyand is designed to carry 5 passengers. It is to be air-launched by carrier aircraft from a Space Adventures spaceport. The spaceport for the Explorer is being developed with Prodea in the United Arab Emirates. (Space Adventures Website, 2008)Technological AdvancementThe key in reducing the cost of space tourism is in development of space is in the development of new space vehicles. The current per pound cost of sending anything to space is simply alike astronomical for accessible space tourism purposes. The costs climb even higher when sending humans into orbit. Many visionaries and entrepreneurs have realized this and are now working on new spacecraft for the purpose of space tourism.As mentioned, spacecraft for space tourism should have the goal of being efficient and accessible. The Soyuz and the Space Shuttle are neither, being too expensive and needing months of training before a space tourist can climb aboard. other implied requirement is that the spacecraft is reusable. Both the space shuttle and the Soyuz are not reusable to some degree (the Space Shuttles fuel tank is unmake upon take off and must be replaced). Another requirement is that passenger preparation be much reduced. Current space tourists must support months of grueling training before being allowed to fly to space. Lastly, with any tourism exper ience, the craft should provide a comfortable and safe ride for its passengers.Today, the most promising space tourism vehicle has been the prototype SpaceShipOne built by Scaled Composites. SpaceShipOne was the winner of the Ansari X-Prize after it was able to reach an altitude of 100 km twice in a two week rate of flow while having the capacity for carrying three people. Clearly these abilities are in line with the objectives of space tourism. SpaceShipOnes flight may not be considered true space flight by some people as it is not able to go into orbit. However at 100km, its passengers will be able to experience weightlessness and will be able to see the curvature of the earth as well as the fading of the atmosphere into the blackness of space.SpaceShipOne was able to do this through its design. Instead of using rockets to lift it to high altitudes, SpaceShipOne was lift first to a high altitude before any rockets were ignited. A conventional jet-powered craft, WhiteKnight, carr ies SpaceShipOne to high altitude. At the predetermined altitude, SpaceShipOne breaks off from WhiteKnight and ignites its hybrid rocket motors to push it to outer space. Upon reentry, SpaceShipOne lands like a conventional plane on a traditional runway. Together with the use of the newest materials and technology, this spaceplane approach was the key in reducing the development and operational costs for SpaceShipOne. SpaceShipOne has now been retired and work is now.ConclusionSpace Tourism may still be a dream for the majority of us but it is undeniable that huge strides have been made in the past decade to make it possible. The development of space vehicles have lowered the cost for space travel and have accelerated the possibility of private space travel. In the next few years, space travel and space tourism will be one of the ordinary things that any family or any person would go to every holiday or every summer. only like any other place in the planet, travel time will be much faster compared to early flights and the cost will be leveled off. All of these advancements will be our debt to all visionaries and the engineers who are building future space vehicles for our use.