Anousheh Ansari: Astronaut
Published on Aug 26, 2006 at 12:17 pm.
6 Comments.
Filed under space businesses, travel.
It was recently announced that the next space tourist will be Anousheh Ansari. I know that some space exploration purists are aghast at the concept of space tourism, but I think that it is a good idea. Getting more private money involved in space will bring the costs down. When air travel was almost entirely government thing (air mail carriers and military), then it was unreasonably expensive. But, when the mail planes started to sell tickets to passengers, air travel was opened to the public. Then more tickets were sold, and then even more. Eventually airplanes were built with more seats for passengers than cargo space for mail. Then, you had air carriers whose business was primarily passengers, with mail carried along on the trip by contract with the post office (sort of the reverse of how it all started!). Now air travel is big business. The cost of air travel, adjusted for inflation, is at an all time low. Not surprisingly, passengers traveling by air are at a high.
So, if more businesses get involved in space exploitation, then the costs will drop. The more people who travel into space, the more efficient space travel will become. Once costs drop to a certain point, then space travel will be as routine as air travel. There will never be a time when everyone will travel in space, of course, nor even a time when most people travel in space. Even today, most people do not travel by air. In fact, only a small percentage of people do so, and only a tiny percentage do so on a regular basis. I routinely meet people who have never been on an airplane! Even some faculty at my college say that they have never been on a plane, and a lot of my students have never flown. Still, everyone is familiar with the concept, and flying is not seen as any big deal — these people just never needed to go long distances quickly.
So, with more companies getting into the space business, and more private citizens going into space, then space travel should become more routine. Ansari is not the first space tourist. There have been others. But, you’d have to work pretty hard to convince me that any of the others were as fitting to be an early space tourist. Anousheh Ansari is one of the backers of the X Prize, renamed the Ansari X Prize. This was an award given to the first private spacecraft to fly two manned missions into space with a very short turnaround. In fact, as it turned out, competition to win the prize also led to the first private manned flight into space at all. Companies competing in the X Prize did not stop once it was over, though. They are still going, and private space travel companies are about to become a reality. So, it is fitting that now she gets to fly into space herself. She had done a great deal to promote the exploitation of space, and I am glad to see her get a chance to fly into space herself.
We are coming into a new age of manned space travel. The first astronauts and cosmonauts were test subjects. Then, we moved into an age of true exploration. Then, we moved into an age of space operations, with satellite deployment and servicing from the Space Shuttle and service missions to Mir and the International Space Station. Now, we are moving into space commerce.
Oh, we’ve had private companies involved in space exploration from near the beginning. Government contractors build most of the systems and many of the satellites early on. Then, private companies, mainly communication companies were building their own satellites and contracting with government agencies (NASA or ESA, for example) to launch them. Then, private imaging satellites became available. Some employees of these aerospace companies rode aboard the Space Shuttle to oversee operations with their company’s assets. And, of course, the Russians have had several space tourists fly on Soyuz service missions to Mir and the ISS. So, Ansari’s flight won’t be the first of its kind, nor the first private citizen’s space mission, but it may be one of the most fitting.
-Astroprof
JackKennedy on August 26, 2006 at 7:02 pm: 1
AGHAST! Good word but I am more aghast by those who remain skeptical and behind the curve on space commercialization. Perhaps Anousheh Ansari will exactly what the industry needs” “Imagine, Inspire, Be the Change!”
http://www.anoushehansari.com/
Spread the word!
psycgirl on August 27, 2006 at 2:44 pm: 2
You know, I never thought of space travel that way! (and I can also now read your blog, since you moved from msn spaces!)
kim on March 27, 2007 at 4:06 am: 3
I think Mrs. Anousheh Ansari and many other, is childless because she is stupid enough to spend 20 millions for her adventure into space. 20 millions could have save millions of starving children. Do not tell me her 20 millions space travel contribute to the secrets of making technology to make better quality food from space as she wrote in the Dallas Morningnews. “I wanna go into space” sound like a child speaking. Send her this picture of a starving child with a vulture behind him to her. It might open your eye also not to support her selfish behaviour. Regard Kim
Astroprof on March 27, 2007 at 2:59 pm: 4
That is rather unfair. My understanding is that she has given a lot of money to all sorts of charities.
Papiya on April 6, 2007 at 12:33 pm: 5
She had taken a revolutionary, pioneering step by flying to outer space. This will have an immense effect on how women are seen and what women can do, in a country she comes from. People like Kim are too small to see this big picture. Her courage and achievement are likely to influence the mindset of the middle east where women are mostly treated like doormats. I hope those women get to read her achievements, come out of the demeaning veils to revolt and show what they also can do. She should be their role-model. Great job, Anousheh!
emma on June 2, 2008 at 3:54 am: 6
she is a good repesentive for iran