Boeing enters new agreement for space tourism

Under the agreement, Space Adventures of Vienna, Va., will promote passenger seats aboard the seven-person spacecraft dubbed the Crew Space Transportation-100.

Human migration to space, starting soon!
“This opportunity to provide transportation services to NASA creates another opportunity to jump-start the human migration to space,” said Brewster Shaw, vice president and general manager of Boeing's Space Exploration division.

“One of our stated goals in our division is to become the Boeing commercial aircraft of human space commerce.”

Boeing, which has years of experience building rockets, is currently developing its new spacecraft in Huntington Beach. The vehicle is designed to fly atop a variety of launch vehicles.

Space Adventures is also experienced in the field as it has organized seven trips to the space station aboard the Russian spacecraft Soyuz.

Together they aim to offer “safe, affordable transportation to commercial spaceflight customers.” Though there are several hindrances, the two companies think they can start the service by the end of 2015.

Space enthusiasts can prepare to tour
In fact, NASA astronauts will not be the only ones getting seats in the capsule. Space tourists, individual companies or other non-government groups will also be able to buy the seats and travel beyond the reach of gravity.

“We want to expand beyond flying astronauts just to the ISS,” said Shaw. “Very few people have made it to orbit of our species -- probably a little over 500 out of 6 or 7 billion people. That's not enough. We want to see many more have that opportunity.”

They refused to reveal the price of a seat aboard the commercial spaceship, but Anderson said it would be “tens of millions of dollars.”

Seven private space travelers were recently sent for the adventure ride by Space Adventures. The cost per seat was approximately $40 million.

“With our customer experience and Boeing's heritage in human spaceflight, our goal is not only to benefit the individuals who fly to space,” said company Chairman Eric Anderson. It's “also to help make the resources of space available to the commercial sector by bringing the value from space back to Earth.”

Space travel cannot be cheap
This new initiative will not make future space travel cheap but could make it much cheaper, he said.

As of now, they refused to reveal the price of a seat aboard the commercial spaceship, but Anderson said it would be “tens of millions of dollars.”

As civilian passengers make it to space, costs for NASA are expected to come down.