This Is The First Luxury Hotel In Outer Space

pack your bags brainiacs we're going on a vacation somewhere far far away no not to the depths of South America or to the edges of Asia because today we're going to now I know what you're thinking isn't it a little too soon for civilians to be going into space surely there's more tests to be done after all we don't want to get out there and find out there's a ton of Xenomorphs on pluto or something well pish-posh to that I say you may not know it but the space industry has seen a ton of innovation over the last couple decades largely due to the increasing involvement of the private sector and it seems like we could be mere months away from space tourism becoming a reality what is space tourism you may ask well it's a rapidly developing segment of the aviation industry that aims to allow your average citizen to become an astronaut and explore the great frontier of space whether that's for fun leisure or business purposes from the time man set foot on the moon and probably even well before then people around the world have looked up to the night sky and aspired to journey beyond it I understand the appeal that unique view of Earth the experience of zero-gravity and the knowledge that you're among one of the first humans in history to journey beyond our atmosphere is priceless actually there is a price and it's really really high but more on that in a second that said a man first set foot on the moon way back in 1969 so why aren't we making frequent trips into the cosmos just yet as usual the answer is related to cost until recently space related activities were so expensive and politically motivated by events such as the Cold War that only government bodies like NASA were really allowed to handle them unfortunately this also meant space exploration relied predominantly on government funding which dried up significantly over time in fact by 2011 NASA had lost so much funding it had to retire its own space shuttle program for good ironically this meant that US astronauts were relying on Russian shuttles for trips to and from the in National Space Station and of the cost of 80 million dollars a trip it wasn't exactly chump change so instead the u.s. pivoted towards contracting private space exploration corporations like SpaceX and Boeing to shuttle its astronauts almost as a space taxi service these contracts are worth a whopping 6.8 billion dollars so I'm hoping these space taxi driver doesn't let the meter run of course since private companies are now in charge of space travel it's in their best interest to reduce costs and maximize profitability and as a result we've seen significant innovation in the industry for example rocket launches used to involve a whole lot of expensive parts that were essentially only good for a one time use since they would disintegrate upon re-entering our atmosphere however in 2018 Elon Musk's SpaceX successfully launched rockets that were able to fly themselves back to earth a development that could save a ton of money in the long run and help make space travel more financially viable it's because of developments like this that the concept of space tourism is even on the table after all imagine if every time you drove a car your engine exploded you probably wouldn't drive anywhere unless you absolutely had to but now imagine your engine doesn't explode you'd be far more likely to take a first spin so now that affordable space travel is suddenly viable and a bunch of companies are already working on putting together commercial space tourism packages with the expectation that people will actually be able to buy them within the next couple of years Virgin Galactic for example is selling seats upon a commercial spacecraft and we'll take a quick flight to the upper atmosphere where you'll be able to float around weightless late and then take in views of the earth and its curved horizon then what will hopefully be a sobering wake-up call for flat earther it's fun probably won't be this quick 20 minute excursion beyond our atmosphere will only start taking place in 2021 at the earliest and is set to cost a whopping 20,000 to 30,000 dollars per head and that's the most economical space tourism option available if you want to get bougie with it though a space tech startup called Orion's span as working on the worlds or should we say universes first a luxury space hotel the Aurora Space Station will be able to host up to six guests at a time including two crew members and costs a whopping nine and a half million dollars for a 12 day tour the hotel will orbit the Earth every 90 minutes meaning guests will see 16 sunrises and sunsets every day and get to engage in activities like zero-gravity ping pong there will even be high-speed internet on board so you can share your once-in-a-lifetime experience with the folks back on earth after all what's a trip to space if you can't flex it on the gram while I keep referring to space tourism as a future activity the reality is it's already happened American multi-millionaire Dennis Tito became the world's first space tourist when he paid 20 million dollars to visit the International Space Station way back in 2009 around 6 people have followed the lead since then but again the costs are so prohibitive that it isn't really worth it for most some industry experts have predicted that the 2020s will mark the culmination of two decades worth of developmental work that has gone into space travel and finally birth the entirely new industry of space tourism of course there are still some problems that need to be overcome currently there is no real regulation as to who will be allowed to fly and who won't unlike your average destination hotel stay being in space is physically stressful so there will need to be some kind of mandate as to who is allowed to fly and who is not or else you could be stuck in a spacecraft feeling nauseous and dizzy or worse for over a week also the risks are still really high an accident in space can be catastrophic and the spacecrafts themselves aren't exactly 100% secure Boeing's Starliner capsule for example was forced to abandon a mission to the International Space Station when it entered the wrong orbit by accident and has almost been destroyed due to technical errors twice fortunately there were no people on board but these aren't really things you want to hear about on our perspective rides so while space tourism is on the horizon it is still super-expensive so only a small group of people aka the SuperDuper rich will actually be able to afford to do it for a while and there's likely gonna be a ton of legislation and safety checks enacted before becomes all accessible to the average person but still it's worth getting excited about afterall you're closer to vacationing on the moon than you think if you enjoyed this video be sure to LIKE and subscribe below then head over to the Brainiac YouTube channel for more futuristic fun [Music] you [Music]

Channel: Brainiac

Views: 34,639

Rating: 4.9153633 out of 5

Keywords: Space, NASA, Elon Musk, SpaceX, Boeing, Tourism, Virgin Galactic, Orion Span, Aurora, Brainiac, space tourism, education, cartoon, animation, animated, facts, moon, mars, infograph, what if, travel, space travel, rocket, astronaut, mission, starlink, starship, launch

Id: w_4D6xKqH9w

Length: 7min 7sec (427 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 18 2020