8 réponses à ce sujet

[Napoleon1853]

http://news.yahoo.co.../od_nm/us_hotel

This sounds interesting. I don't think I would be able to afford staying in it though, lol.

BARCELONA (Reuters) – A company behind plans to open the first hotel in space says it is on target to accept its first paying guests in 2012 despite critics questioning the investment and time frame for the multi-billion dollar project.

The Barcelona-based architects of The Galactic Suite Space Resort say it will cost 3 million euro ($4.4 million) for a three-night stay at the hotel, with this price including an eight-week training course on a tropical island.

During their stay, guests would see the sun rise 15 times a day and travel around the world every 80 minutes. They would wear velcro suits so they can crawl around their pod rooms by sticking themselves to the walls like Spiderman.

Galactic Suite Ltd's CEO Xavier Claramunt, a former aerospace engineer, said the project will put his company (http://www.galacticsuite.com) at the forefront of an infant industry with a huge future ahead of it, and forecast space travel will become common in the future.

"It's very normal to think that your children, possibly within 15 years, could spend a weekend in space," he told Reuters Television.

A nascent space tourism industry is beginning to take shape with construction underway in New Mexico of Spaceport America, the world's first facility built specifically for space-bound commercial customers and fee-paying passengers.

British tycoon Richard Branson's space tours firm, Virgin Galactic, will use the facility to propel tourists into suborbital space at a cost of $200,000 a ride.

Galactic Suite Ltd, set up in 2007, hopes to start its project with a single pod in orbit 450 km (280 miles) above the earth, traveling at 30,000 km per hour, with the capacity to hold four guests and two astronaut-pilots.

It will take a day and a half to reach the pod - which Claramunt compared to a mountain retreat, with no staff to greet the traveler.

"When the passengers arrive in the rocket, they will join it for 3 days, rocket and capsule. With this we create in the tourist a confidence that he hasn't been abandoned. After 3 days the passenger returns to the transport rocket and returns to earth," he said.

More than 200 people have expressed an interest in traveling to the space hotel and at least 43 people have already reserved.

The numbers are similar for Virgin Galactic with 300 people already paid or signed up for the trip but unlike Branson, Galactic Suite say they will use Russian rockets to transport their guests into space from a spaceport to be built on an island in the Caribbean.

But critics have questioned the project, saying the time frame is unreasonable and also where the money is coming from to finance the project.

Claramunt said an anonymous billionaire space enthusiast has granted $3 billion to finance the project.

(Writing by Stuart McDill; Editing by Belinda Goldsmith and Miral Fahmy)

[Syrellaris]

lol with those prices only the rich would be able to do it, and they be bankrupt soon.

[Mordaedil]

Space Age, here we come!

[Sol Nox]

Napoleon1853 wrote...

Claramunt said an anonymous billionaire space enthusiast has granted $3 billion to finance the project.

You know who else was back by anonymous billionaires? The X-men.  Or something, accuracy isn't my point.  But when I got to that line I just thought this sounded too much like the opening of a comic book.  Now what would an evil league have to gain by sending rich people into space...

[MessWitDaBull]

Well the thing is, yes it's expensive now, but as more revenue starts being generated propulsion techniques can be refined and breakthroughs made -- come on, with the ******-poor budget that NASA has do you really think they're going to make any huge advancements in propulsion or bringing down the cost of sending people into space?



Development trends do point towards the private sector being neccesary to develop anything past its infancy (look at computers or commercial air travel -- both of these taken-for-granted things were truly made possible through the investment of money and time by people in the private sector).

[This Is Sparta]

Mordaedil wrote...

Space Age, here we come!

U mean Star Wars here we come!  

[Vlaid]

Sounds promising.



If only because it will send the economy on a trend torwards space settlement. As mentioned above, we need more than NASA propelling us into space if we ever want to make any meaningful technological breakthroughs to make it affordable to the average human.



Once space starts getting commercialized, we'll see better, bigger, and cheaper space travel possible, and doubtfully ever before then.

[eaterofideals]

I just want to know why who would want to spend 200 grand to stay three days in a tiny pod orbiting space? What are they gonna do while there up there. eh? Not like there going to go through a few months of training to get certified to wear the suit and go out into the vaccum now is it? Horray for you, you went into orbit and didn't do a damn thing.



I can do the same thing for the price of a dimebag.

[stevej713]

MessWitDaBull wrote...

Well the thing is, yes it's expensive now, but as more revenue starts being generated propulsion techniques can be refined and breakthroughs made -- come on, with the ******-poor budget that NASA has do you really think they're going to make any huge advancements in propulsion or bringing down the cost of sending people into space?

Development trends do point towards the private sector being neccesary to develop anything past its infancy (look at computers or commercial air travel -- both of these taken-for-granted things were truly made possible through the investment of money and time by people in the private sector).

I agree.  I think a great example is the Virgin space tour program (I don't remember what it is called), and NASA never came up with anything close to it.

Modifié par stevej713, 05 novembre 2009 - 11:34 .