Skift Take
Virgin Galactic is joining the likes of Blue Origin and Space Perspective in opening up the last frontier to all who can afford it, which is good news for travel agencies like Rocket Breaks.
Jesse Chase Lubitz
As the space industry continues to grow and diversify, Virgin Galactic plans to send three paying passengers to the edge of space on June 8.
“Right now, we have about 3,000 to 4,000 people on the waiting list for these trips,” said David Doughty, co-founder of space-tourism company Rocket Breaks, which has signed contracts with seven tourists wanting to launch into orbit and has set a date for one of them.
The Virgin Galactic flight will take off from New Mexico on Saturday, carrying three civilian passengers from California, New York and Italy, along with Tuva Cihangir Atasever, a researcher and astronaut from infrastructure company Axiom Space, and two commanders.
Virgin Galactic has not released the identities of the commercial passengers.
In an email to Skift, the company said, “We don’t think of our mission of sending people into space as ‘tourism.’ When people fly with us, they become astronauts on a very thoughtful, purposeful journey that begins when they purchase their ticket.”
The passengers, whose identities have not been revealed, will enjoy a roughly 90-minute journey to the edge of space, which will include several minutes of weightlessness.
The company’s website lists the price of a ticket for a spaceflight as $450,000, but it’s unclear how much passengers actually pay. In a recent earnings call, executives said they want tickets to cost $600,000. Blue Origin doesn’t disclose prices, but they’re said to range from $200,000 to more than $1 million.
Space Tourism Industry
Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic are known for shorter, suborbital flights, while SpaceX is focused on ferrying tourists into orbit and to the International Space Station.
In August 2023, Virgin Galactic will take into space a health and wellness coach and her 18-year-old daughter who won a fundraising contest for Space for Humanity, a nonprofit organization that aims to democratize space travel.
Blue Origin, owned by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, has sent more than 20 passengers into space, while Elon Musk’s SpaceX returned an all-tourist crew from space in 2021.
The industry is growing and diversifying: A company called Space Perspective is offering a more luxurious experience, complete with VIP seating, restrooms, Michelin-star catering, and WiFi, that lasts nearly six hours instead of 90 minutes round trip.
Space Travel Agency
“This is our No. 1 product,” Doughty said. “People don’t necessarily want this 15-minute adrenaline-packed field trip. They want a full experience. We have people planning to get married, people having the first wedding in space.”
Doughty said there are about 800 names on the waiting list for Space Perspective, which is scheduled to take off for its first flight in 2027.
After this flight, Virgin Galactic plans to retire its current spacecraft and begin development of a new generation of Delta spacecraft, which the company hopes will have the capacity to launch up to eight times a month and carry many more passengers. Flights with private astronauts are expected to resume in 2026. But in the meantime, the company will have to find a way to stay financially viable.
The future of space tourism
Rocket Breaks sees the industry expanding into different types of experiences. “You can really personalize experiences and we help people find the trip they want,” Doughty says. “We can plan anything from a kid meeting an astronaut for their birthday, to a bucket list trip for a gravity-defying 70-year-old, to something for a Premier League footballer wanting a rush of adrenaline.”
Rocket Breaks director Barry Shanks said the technology was developing rapidly and trust was gradually growing. “I think we’ll see an increase as more marketing is done,” he said.
“Longer term, we’re looking at a trip around the moon in 10 years’ time that’s no different to flying from London to Australia,” Rocket Breaks’ Shanks said.
Photo credit: Virgin Galactic’s first mission carrying passengers will be in August 2023.
