Gates to join Simonyi in space?

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Wednesday, 11 April 2007 16:28

Science - Space

On Russian state television, cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin tells journalists in a live video interview from the ISS that “Charles said that Bill Gates is also preparing to visit space”.

Could the itch to visit space fast become the ‘must-have’ experience for anyone easily able to afford it? You can scratch me from the list right now only because I don’t have a spare US $25 million to do it, but were I able to take a trip into space and visit the ISS I’d be the next in line to go.

With Charles Simonyi the 5th space tourist, how long might it be before a 6th decides it’s time to make the trek into space – and will it be Bill Gates?

While I can confirm that it sadly won’t be me next in orbit, there has been no confirmation by Gates, anyone at Microsoft or at ‘Space Adventures’, the company that organizes space tourists to travel on the Russian Soyuz rocket to travel into space and dock with the ISS, on any plans or a timeframe for Bill Gates to go off world.

Yet cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin suggests it will be Bill up next the ultimate space thrill.

As reported by the Associated Press, Yurchikhin told journalists: “So the next time someone will be with Bill Gates. For me this is the biggest surprise of our flight.”

It’s also clear from the AP report that Virgin Galactic is going to have some real competition for getting people into the edges of space for a brief sensation of weightlessness, as we learn that Space Adventures is looking to more options than the current US $25 million multiday space flight and ISS orbit package.

For US $100 million, you’ll be able to take a flight around the moon, while just US $100,000 you can have a five minute sub-orbital space flight, which sounds much like the Virgin Galactic option at less than half the price.

It all makes us wonder: how much for a moon landing, and return flight? And by when?

A quarter of a billion dollars? Half a billion dollars? Even a cool billion?

Despite the US $100 million dollar cost, if Space Adventures is almost ready to start flying people around the moon and back, it’s exactly the kind of development sci-fi aficionados have waited decades for, ever since we started travelling to the final frontier in the first place.

So, whether Bill Gates will be the next space tourist or not, the fact we have space tourism at all is a tremendous advance, and the next 20 to 30 years should see plenty more, both advances and space tourists!