Space tourism is close. Very close. I had known for a while that it was going to be possible soon for those who have the money to ride a special jet that kind of skims out past the atmosphere and technically makes it out there. It was exciting, but kind of not exciting, if you know what I mean.But now we're talking space elevators. Moon hotels. Slowly rotating low-gravity swimming pools where you can pop out of the water like a flying fish (I want to know who came up with that one. It's cute.) This kind of stuff is projected for 2025.
The most interesting part of all of this is the idea of a space hotel. If you were rich, you could stay in one of these for a few nights for about 4 million dollars. But if you're not? Well, we can't exactly leave these high-paying tourists all alone in their moon rooms to fend for themselves.
So are we going to have people living and working full-time in service positions in space? The majority of jobs needed for the daily operations of a hotel aren't the most rewarding or enjoyable in the world, so I've got to wonder. Your job sucks, but you're living on the moon. Is that a plus or a minus? How long does it take to get sick of something like that?
And also, how does the pay situation work out? You can't really spend your money from the moon, unless Amazon is going to start delivering there. I can only assume your basic needs will be provided for by your employer, but what about entertainment? Communication with friends and family back home? Will the moon get cable? How do you live on the moon?
(Spacefuture.com actually predicts 2 month rotations for moon staff-- so it could be that you're just expected to go without this stuff until your shift is up.)
Apparently, though, this is something that students from the University of Delaware are interested in doing. According to Science Daily's article on space tourism, the University of Delaware is a Land, Sea, Urban, and Space Grant university. So their students majoring in tourism and hospitality are being encouraged to pursue job opportunities in space.
Now, that's ambitious.
(Image credit: Shimizu Corporation, Tokyo, Japan)
1 comment:
2025 sounds ambitious, unless they're planning to add hotel suites to the ISS.
However. If they can get nanotubes and buckeyballs to where we're building space elevators out of 'em, that would be the revolution we'd be waiting for.
Until then, it's not terribly feasible, because you need to get your hotel up first. The cost and work that has gone into th ISS shows us that we need a real new breakthrough of some kind before we can start to get people into space on a regular basis, 4 million dollars or no.
I know we will, though. And I can't claim that breakthrough won't happen tomorrow. At this very moment, though, trying to be realistic, I don't see that happening by 2025.
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