The end of space tourism is near (again)

The commercial space community was atwitter (figuratively and literally) over a Russian news report that Russia planned to end taking space tourists to the ISS after this March’s return trip by Charles Simonyi. The implication was that there wouldn’t again be any other means of visiting the ISS.

However, this report is hardly the breaking [...]

Virgin update and other notes

Rob Coppinger of Flightglobal.com covered a speech this morning by Will Whitehorn of Virgin Galactic at a UK space conference. Whitehorn said that the first flight of WhiteKnightTwo will be “soon” (but we’ve heard that before) and that SpaceShipTwo is “almost finished”. Virgin Galactic is now putting its second group of 100 [...]

Garriott says game over; is a space career next?

Richard Garriott, the space tourist who flew to the International Space Station last month, is leaving computer game company NCSoft to pursue new ventures that were at least inspired by his recent trip to space. “Many of you probably wonder what my plans are, now that I have achieved the lifelong dream of going [...]

Garriott in orbit

Richard Garriott is now the sixth commercial passenger to fly into orbit on a Soyuz taxi flight to the ISS. The Soyuz TMA-13 spacecraft lifted off on schedule at 3:01 am EDT (0701 GMT) and entered orbit nine minutes later. The flight is a realization of a long-term dream of Garriott, son of [...]

Esther Dyson to be Simonyi’s backup

Space Adventures announced today that Esther Dyson will train as the backup to Charles Simonyi for his spring 2009 flighyt. Dyson will pay $3 million for the training, similar to the training that Nik Halik paid for as Richard Garriott’s backup. Dyson, who made her name in the computer industry as the longtime [...]

Update on Russia and Space Adventures

To update my earlier post, I spoke briefly yesterday with Eric Anderson of Space Adventures to try and clarify any apparent contradictions between the company’s announcements and statements by the Russian space agency Roskosmos. Anderson said that Perminov’s statement that he had “no information about such plans” was reference to reports about Sergey Brin [...]

Russian miscommunication on Space Adventures’ plans

An article in Saturday’s edition of Florida Today reports that NASA “was among the last to know” about Space Adventures’ plans for a dedicated Soyuz flight to the ISS in late 2011. Of course, NASA didn’t need to be consulted prior to the announcement, so that’s not too surprising, although NASA and the other [...]

Space Adventures press conference: brief summary

Here are some of the key items from this morning’s press conference held by Space Adventures about their future plans (see their press release for some additional details):

The first major announcement was that the company has reached an agreement with Roskosmos, the Russian space agency, for a dedicated Soyuz flight to the ISS in the [...]

Sergey Brin, space tourist?

An intriguing short item in today’s San Jose Mercury News about the Space Adventures press conference later today:

Space tourists are getting their own ride. Space Adventures, a Virginia company that arranges passage for wealthy explorers to ride on Russian Soyuz rockets to the International Space Station, plans to buy a Soyuz flight all its own [...]

Space Adventures announcement next week

Space Adventures sent out a media advisory yesterday announcing a press conference planned for Wednesday, June 11, in New York. The press conference will reveal the identity of a “notable future orbital client” as well as “significant announcements regarding new orbital spaceflight planning”, including a “vision for the next decade”. Richard Garriott, currently [...]