Virgin Galactic has unveiled the space craft they hope will be the first to regularly carry tourists up to space. Well, up to a suborbital altitude and come down. The new craft, cleverly named Spaceship Two, will be carried part way up by a four-engine jet called White Knight Two. Reserving one of the six passenger seats cost $200,000, but you can put your deposit down now for the first flights expected to start in 2009.
I should be more excited about this than I am, but I can’t help but feel … well .. it’s only suborbital. Is that really space? Let me know when they start giving us orbits around the earth. Then I’ll be psyched.
January 25, 2008 at 1:25 pm
Theme Park Earth; where the admission is free but rides cost serious money. That said, it’s probably the best ride ever
(and at least they made the space craft and its taxi look cool)
January 25, 2008 at 2:00 pm
I think I would be more excited if they were powered by poop fuel. Seriously. I would totally be all over that.
What I’m most curious about, though, is a) how long it will take the price for this and b) how long until this becomes more than a ‘go up and look around’ - the scifi part of me totally sees something going wrong on the ISS, and the only available craft that can reach it is spaceship two, thus launching the venture into a higher orbit, as it were.
January 25, 2008 at 2:27 pm
Wasn’t that the theme of Space Camp?