New York – A day after NASA’s space shuttle Discovery returned safely, a private space-tourism firm announced Wednesday that it will offer trips around the moon aboard a Russian spaceship. The price tag: $100 million.
“We have identified over a thousand people around the world who have the financial resources to participate in an expedition to the moon,” said Eric Anderson, president and chief executive of Space Adventures Ltd., who grew up in Littleton and is a 1992 graduate of Columbine High School.
Throwing down a promotional gauntlet, Anderson added: “But the question remains, who among this group has the sense of exploration and adventure to undertake such a historic mission?”
Anderson’s company, based in Arlington, Va., already has sent two tourists aloft – American Dennis Tito and South African Mark Shuttleworth – for stays on the international space station. Tickets for that trip cost a mere $20 million.
Aiming to become the third space-station tourist, Gregory Olsen of New Jersey is training in Russia for a 10-day October trip. Olsen, 60, is a millionaire scientist and founder of infrared cameramaker Sensors Unlimited Inc.
“Who wouldn’t want to go to the moon?” Olsen asked.
Space Adventures is promoting the moon trip by promising views from the lunar orbit of the Earth and the dark side of the moon.
The company said the first moon tourist will become a global role model and celebrity and one of the first people to orbit the moon since NASA’s Apollo program ended more than three decades ago.
“We’ve never been better prepared to take on a mission to the moon,” said Nikolai Sevastyanov, president and designer general of the Russian Rocket and Space Corporation Energia, which provides rockets to the Russian space agency Roskosmos. “We are confident that we can implement this program on schedule.”
Space Adventures’ moon trips could take off as early as 2008, company officials said.
The company may beat NASA back to the moon. President Bush has set a goal of returning astronauts there by 2020, to be followed by missions to Mars.
“We support private industry and their ventures into space,” NASA spokesman Dean Acosta said. “But there’s a difference between tourism and exploration, and NASA conducts exploration on behalf of the American people.”
Soyuz was originally designed for lunar missions, although none ever occurred. Anderson called it the most reliable craft in the history of space travel.
Its crew space is about the size of a large SUV. The cosmonaut and two passengers would sleep in reclining chairs, Sevastyanov said.
Space Adventures has partnered with RSC Energia and the Federal Space Agency of the Russian Federation, through which they sent space tourists Tito and Shuttleworth on a Soyuz for their stays on space station Alpha.
The next mission is slated to send a team up to the space station for 10 days starting Oct. 1.
Future lunar tourists could book one of two itineraries:
A nonstop flight to the moon lasting eight or nine days. The Soyuz would rise to orbit Earth on a rocket and meet up with a second booster rocket to give the craft a push to the moon.
A trip lasting up to 21 days, including a leisurely layover at the international space station before docking with the booster, which is to be assembled in orbit.
In both cases, the flight to the moon and back takes about 5 1/2 days.
The Associated Press and Bloomberg News contributed to this report.
