it's been just over a century since man
first achieved powered flight while the
public now enjoys taking planes to
almost anywhere in the world the tourism
industry is setting its sights on the
next Frontier sending private
individuals to
space at the moment this is just The
Preserve of the Rich and interested but
what we want to find out is whether or
not space could soon become a place that
we're all saving up to visit it and for
budding astronauts without millions of
dollars to spare is there a more
affordable space likee experience to be
had in the meantime it's all floating
around in a wet dream
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we've come to Washington DC to meet the
president of a company called Space
Adventures what they are is basically a
glorified travel agency selling package
holiday to space to very rich people if
you've got unlimited amounts of money
what sort of a space holiday can you go
on at the
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moment Ben how you doing nice to meet
you this is Space Adventures
headquarters here here just outside
Washington
DC this is the Allan space suit and if
you're up on the International Space
Station and you wanted to go out on a
space walk uh this is the space suit
that you'd wear none of our clients have
done the space walk yet but uh a lot of
them have been interested in it and what
it really is is a a self-contained
spacecraft it has all the equipment in
the back for life support people get
claustrophobic in this thing is that's
one of the things that you need to
overcome um you you need to get
comfortable inside it what you basically
do if you step in here mhm I would I
would only do one arm to be honest cuz
it's a little cuz you're so broad
shouldered yeah it feels great inside
here yeah this astronaut had small
thumbs I
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think what would you be able to sell me
at the moment we can send you as far as
the moon uh we can't land on the moon
but what we will do is send around the f
side come to within about 100 km of the
Moon surface and then come back again
and how much would that cost me it would
cost $150
million
so if I didn't have $150 million what's
the next step down that I could
experience you can live in space on
board the International Space Station
you can live there for up to 2 weeks and
how much did that cost we could arrange
a flight for around $50 million 5050
million
yeah and and for everyday people who
have grown up with a passion and a
desire to go to space what's the closest
thing to space that they could
experience at the moment for a sum of
money that they could potentially save
up for so they could experience a zerog
g flight we can get a few moments of of
weightlessness I think it totals about
seven or eight minutes over the course
of a flight and you can experience what
it is like to float in space as if you
are an astronaut are you working towards
democratizing this experience in any way
yes I think what we're doing is already
democratizing The Experience there are
550 people who have ever flown to space
in the last 50 years seven of those are
private individuals and that's not an
insignificant contribution as far as
making space something that everyday
people can visit that's it's another
decade or so away the zero gravity
flight is something that we want to try
out is that worth the money for me it's
a tremendous experience something that
you remember for a long long time
afterwards and in fact we have a flight
uh in in Florida and if you want to join
that you're absolutely more than welcome
thank you really good
good maybe it's my lack of imagination
but I find it hard to believe that in 30
years time we're all going to be going
on holiday to space for me it's
something that exists in films and in
science classes and sort of through a
telescope and talking to Tom I wasn't
that convinced that he'd given the
Democrat ization of space travel that
much thought but I left thinking well
who are these people that are willing to
spend that kind of money on a trip to
space which is why we're going to New
York to meet a guy called Richard garot
because he's one of the seven people
that Space Adventures have managed to
sell one of these packages to
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Richard garot made his millions from
designing fantasy computer games and
like any respectable fantasist I'd been
told his house was like a museum to the
weird and
wonderful welcome welcome in how you
[Music]
doing the house is full of of unusual uh
Creations I'm really into swords and
crossbows and armor inter miixed amongst
that are some things you might consider
a bit maob these are vampire hunting
kits and these are authentic shrunken
human
heads Richard is the only second
generation astronaut in America his dad
flew fin NASA and traveling to space has
been his lifelong dream is this your
sort of dedicated space corner there's
more than one dedicated space Corner in
this house these are the big artifacts
the vehicle that I went up on was a
Russian soyuz when you're on board that
vehicle you still wear uh protective
garment on the inside just in case there
is a depressurization event in the
capsule when you go through the launch
process you're in the spacit for 10 12
14 hours or so and so most people within
that period of time have gone to the
bathroom at least once and so in the
space suit you actually wear a diaper
this little seat here that's next to me
normally for launch and re-entry it's
it's really reclined back like this and
the windows inside out that's actually
what you see on the inside uhhuh so this
distance you know this may what 4 in 4
in outside of your shoulder during
re-entry you're you're hitting the
atmosphere so fast at 177,000 M an hour
that you're creating a plasma that is
hotter than the surface of the Sun so
right here it is hotter than the surface
of the Sun and it's only this far away
from your body and so uh that is a uh
shall we say a surreal
moment my desire was always to go to
space you know when when I was young my
father was ask as you obviously know my
rightand neighbor was Joe Engel another
astronaut my left-hand neighbor Hoot
Gibson another astronaut and so I grew
up just believing that travel in space
was sort of the Manifest Destiny of
everyone and it was a NASA Doctor Who
told me one year when I was about 13
that I needed glasses and oh by the way
that disqualifies you from being a NASA
astronaut and I was crushed I just got
kicked out of the club that my father my
neighbors all everyone in my
neighborhood was a member of and this
one guy just nonchalantly just kind of
kicked me out that's when I said okay
that's wrong that that guy can't be the
gatekeeper to space if I can't go by
that person's rules I'm going to have to
go help make my own rules and that's why
I've been devoted to commercialization
of access to space for you know the rest
of my life and how much exactly did you
pay $30
million wow and when I did that I was H
very happy to do it however then another
interesting thing happened which is the
first year of your training is Medical
prequal
ification so you've already paid
millions of dollars you're never getting
it back and I get a phone call from the
medical team that says Richard you have
a disqualifying medical condition you're
ineligible to
fly and I'm like how can this happen and
what they told me was is they said a
normal human liver has six loes and a
lobe has one artery that feeds it and
one vein that drains it you are missing
a vein 2 hours later I get a call back
and I say
Richard we think we can fix
So within 2 or 3 days we have to take
you to a hospital where they're going to
remove that lobe of your liver and
that's what they did and so this is my
momento this is the life-threatening
surgery I had to go through to
re-qualify and the doctor by the way is
going like Richard you know as a medical
professional I have to tell you I should
you shouldn't go through the surgery
because it's life-threatening and you
don't need it you're a perfectly healthy
person people would say that's a kind of
almost an unhealthy obsession with going
to space at that point you could but I
wasn't a little thing like you know the
possibility of death you know getting
the
way do you think going to space has
changed you absolutely my conception of
the scale of the earth went from this
ambiguous hard to you know Global giant
thing to suddenly being finite and
small the feeling of weightlessness and
the beauty of The View out the window is
so compelling uh that I think it would
be very difficult to not want to stay
forever after meeting Richard he's
clearly got such a passion for the
universe the fact that he's been able to
fulfill his dream of going to space is
amazing really and now that space travel
has been taken out of the hands of
government organizations and put into
the hands of private individuals the
sort of innovation that creat people
Like Richard will bring to the space
industry is really exciting and what I
wonder is whether or not people like him
will have been written into the history
books as Pioneers who have made
commercial space travel for everyone
else
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possible on a pack back plane to Florida
the idea that space could be the final
destination still seemed like a
fantasy perhaps this had changed once
had got a taste for weightlessness on
Earth but would it be worth the $5,000
ticket so it's about4 to 9 in the
morning we're in a car park outside an
airport hotel in Tampa we're here
because we're about to be inducted into
the zero gravity
experience so what I've heard about this
is that it's one of the closest
experiences can have of space while
still kind of essentially on Earth it's
the only it's absolutely it's the only
way to experience weightlessness here on
Earth without going to space so it will
be little short burst of it but it's
exactly the same Sensation that you will
have if you go to space You're Going to
Be Free Falling inside the aircraft so
the plane is going to fly at about a 45°
angle up and then about a 45° angle down
so when you're going up you're going to
feel about 1.8 times your body weight
1.8 G's and then right as you push over
the top that's when you become
weightless so here's your flight suit
what most people notice
is this is going to be upside down and
it's an old NASA tradition we're going
to keep it upside down until you finish
your first flight and then we're going
to turn it right side up thank you very
much thank you I'll see you in z
[Music]
I feel like a big fake astronaut but it
feels
[Laughter]
great The Sensation that you are going
to feel today of GeForce one is not a
simulation it's the real
deal what they say is that this is part
of training to become a space tourist is
that something that you'd want to do as
well absolutely in the future in a
couple years I'm hoping it's going to
take off the ground and I want to be one
of the first people go up there look
above the earth look down on Earth and
get to experience weightlessness all
again why why why do you think this is
the kind of thing that people want to do
because I think it's the future I I
think in the future we're going to be
having a lot of flights to the Moon
maybe even Mars and we've always been
tether bound to this earth and I think
man just wants to get up and explore the
heavens
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after takeoff we climbed to 30,000 ft
and got positioned in the padded area of
the modified Boeing
747 how you feeling now still a little
nervous still little bit nervous don't
be nervous
Tim the first Dives East as in by
simulating Martian gravity which is 62%
lower than the pull on
Earth naturally the slight is shunt in
One Direction sent you flying in the
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other is absolutely incredible never
experienced anything like
it when zero gravity came it felt as if
my entire body had been filled with
helium and like giddy children all of us
were overcome with
[Laughter]
hysterics out of nowhere this mess just
comes and you're just being suck to the
floor nothing that you can do about it
without blood rushing to your head and
the fluid ducts in your ears keeping you
balanced this upside down weightless
reality was oddly intuitive
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it's all floa floating around in a what
[Applause]
dream I'm just trying to hold down a bit
of sick to be
honest the nausea comes in from the the
constant sort of up and down having
pressure put on your body and then being
sort of released it's kind of like
someone squeezing your
stomach so if space is a kind of
permanent weightlessness then you can
imagine that that that would actually be
much nicer than what we've just
[Music]
experienced and first didn't know what
to expect and the next thing you knew
gravity was off I was floating and from
that point on it was I could do anything
there was no restrictions No Boundaries
if everyone could just give it a try and
it opens up a whole new world does this
feel like you're a step closer to space
it does it feels like you're not
confined by gravity you're not confined
by laws of physics you could just do
what you want to do you're a space
Ambassador now we are we both are yes
let's H all right
you are now
officially a Zer G
member yeah congratulations for your
flight and everything hope you enjoyed
it thank you very much I guess the zero
g group are kind of a bit like the space
equivalent of crack dealers they'll give
a little taste of weightlessness to a
few people and then they'll go off and
tell all their friends how good it is
and then people get a bit addicted but I
do feel like I've just had some sort of
near space experience and I feel really
privileged to have done
that space tourism could be seen as a
bit of a fad for the wealthy in this
transitional period until these private
companies innovate to the point where
the price of leaving the atmosphere
Isn't So
astronomical by the end of my trip it
didn't seem so ridiculous to imagine a
mass Market version of space travel
would I want to go to space on holiday I
might just prefer to go camping
somewhere but when it gets All Star Trek
perhaps I'll change my mind
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