Millions of people may become astronauts

[Waspie_Dwarf]

Millions of people may become astronauts

An adventure vacation will mean blasting off for a cruise in low-Earth orbit, and flights from New York to Sydney will take about two hours.

British entrepreneur and adventurer Richard Branson -- who, in the past three decades, launched airlines and who plans to launch spaceships soon -- predicts flights such as these reflect the next breakthrough in air travel.

In the next 30 years, he says, spaceflight will be nearly as common for travelers as taking a plane trip became for millions across the world in the past 30 years.

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[tipotep]

As long as it can be proven to be safe , count me in

2 hours from NY to Sydney , now thats one fast trip ....

Interested to see how much the trip would cost , I will throw it out there and have a guess at about $5-8 k US a trip , any takers?

TiP.

[Professor T]

Cool!!!!

Count me in..

I've been carsick, seasick, airsick but I've never been spacesick.

[Grandpa Greenman]

Safe? space will never be safe. Things can go real wrong real quick. It would be worth it, though. The only thing I would have a hard time with, like Prof T I would get very space sick. I get sick standing on the dock looking at the boat.

[Taun]

I'm a bit more skeptical about this... I think that in 30 years we will look back and not see much difference... There may be some low orbital traffic, but by and large, the vast majority of people will not ever have the opportunity to travel outside of the atmosphere...

Sad really... I had so much hope for our future in space.. but I guess I'm just pessimistic about it... Scientists will be able to go... Robots will go... maybe even Engineers will be allowed to go... people won't be....

Hopefully I'm wrong... but until space exploration is taken out of the hands of bureaucrats, politicians and accountants, I don't see it progressing much past what it is now....

[TheMolePatrol]

I think I've read before that the ticket prices are expected to be around $200,000 a person.

[A rather obscure Bassoon]

To be honest,maybe 30 years is a bit optimistic.....

[Hippycrite]

Branson is a genius entrepeneur, but but I think he's just daydreaming on this one. Instead of millions of travellers, I would imagine maybe hundreds, and the passengers would be mostly show-biz or big-biz types. The ones who could afford to chip in for gas. Will there even be any fuel available in 30 years?

[DONTEATUS]

We dont need any Stinkin GAS ! Sir Branson is miles ahead of that ! Were going to use all the old Tires !

[csspwns]

if only we could teleport to school :3

[Render]

Im surprised to still see so many pessimistic statements, in the sense that 30 years is not realistic.

I think it will be well before 30 years time these possibilities will become fact. Just look at the past 30 years and how fast everything has progressed. The process of progress is only speeding up. Suggesting it would take more than 30 years is not consistent with the speed of progress we've been seeing.

[Mr Supertypo]

If space in the next 30y is still governement controlled, then I dont think we see much difference. But if private space is on the show, then im optimistick.

[Chooky88]

People like Branson have the money and the vision. Look where NASA got us in 30 years? NASA has been great with sensible un manned flight but always needed govt dollars. Billionaires putting up their own cash to get average people into space is the way to go. Thanks Sir Richard.

[Psycho78]

There won't be any "commoners" allowed into space until there is some degree of official UFO dislcosure. The concepts for where we would be in the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey, were carefully considered by top scientific minds of the day and were very realistic and achievable, but that reality was intentionally derailed to maintain the societal illusions that secure global base conciousness. Ironically, it is this derailment that is leading to over population and the excuses needed thin the heard, as it were.

I always believed that in the future, it would be inevtiable that as more and more people ventured into space, realestate on the Earth would become too expensive for the lower classes, and that would save the planet, but now I realize that we just aren't going into space. Instead we are going to the camps to be sorted. Some will be salvaged, but most will not. This is not inevitable, but likely considering the self imposed blockade of perception that most people cling to, even most of those who read this forum.