DNA Explainer: Want to become 'private astronaut' and try your hands on space travel, here's your chance

Are you interested in travelling to space? Do outer space and its mysteries entice you? Then here's your golden chance to see the outer world from a very close distance. But then for this, you have to be prepared to shell out a hefty amount from your pocket. Space tourism is human space travel for recreational, leisure, or business purposes. There are different types of space tourism, including orbital, suborbital, and lunar space tourism. The whole idea behind this is that those who are not astronauts but want to go to space for non-scientific purposes can get an opportunity to do so.

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So to get a seat aboard one of Virgin Galactic's upcoming spaceflights you have to pay an enormous sum of USD 450,000. However, it is still less than what a winning bidder paid for in June to fly with Amazon founder and billionaire Jeff Bezos in his rocket ship, New Shepard. Through a winning bid of USD 28 million, the bidder booked a seat for himself in the rocket ship. Over 7,600 people had registered from 159 countries to bid for this seat. However, it did not go down too well with the common public and more than 50,000 people signed online petitions urging Bezos to not return to Earth after he took his space flight on July 20.

(Image Source: Reuters)

Earlier, Richard Branson, the billionaire owner of Virgin Galactic, himself reached the edge of space on July 11 along with three employees from his company who also boarded SpaceShipTwo. Apart from Virgin Galactic, companies including Virgin Atlantic, SpaceX, XCOR Aerospace, Blue Origin and Armadillo Aerospace are working on providing space tourism services to people.

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Meanwhile, California-based 'The Spaceship Company' owned by Virgin Galactic, which is the manufacturer of SpaceShipTwo, on Thursday announced that it was resuming the sale of tickets for its space travel at a price almost double of what was charged previously. As per the claims made by the company, SpaceShipTwo can carry a total of eight people, including two pilots, and has more windows than any other spacecraft.

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To book a ticket for Virgin Galactic, the potential tourists have to pay a USD 1000 fully refundable registration fee. After this, they will be notified as and when tickets go on sale. The company said on its website previously that though they have not finalised the ticket prices, it will be more than the USD 250,000 ticket price offered to those who signed up early. Over 600 people have already made the bookings. BBC report says singer Justin Beiber and actor Leonardo DiCaprio are among the 600 people who have already paid to become 'private astronauts' to be able to see Earth from space. The company’s plan is to eventually operate hundreds of spaceflights each year from Spaceport America in New Mexico.

(Image Source: Reuters)