Hyperbola recently asked Space Adventures some questions by email about this proposed private Soyuz flight to the International Space Station (ISS). Interestingly although space tourist Richard Garriott, a co-founder of the company, wants to go back to the ISS he told Hyperbola that he did not expect to be one of the customers for the private Soyuz flight; which Flightglobal first reported on in July 2003. Yes that date is 2000 and three

At the Paris air show last month the head of the Russian Federal Space Agency Anatoly Perminov said that Roscosmos would not "abandon space tourism" but he indicated that it would be many years after the September flight of Guy Laliberté before another ISS visit would take place. On the other hand, if Japan's HTV resupply vehicle fails during its mission this September there may need to be a reduction in ISS crew size, at which point Space Adventures is back in business

As you will read below, with a minimum 30 month lead time between ordering the rocket and spacecraft and the mission, to send two tourists to ISS by the end of the latest target date of 2013, a deal has to be done by June 2011. Below and in the extended portion of this blog post are the questions and answers from Space Adventures chief executive Eric Anderson

1 How are you marketing such a mission?

We are discussing the opportunity with various individuals and corporations around the globe.

2 What is the seat price for such a trip? How do you calculate that?

credit: Virgin Galactic / caption:  

Go here to find the test logs for Rocket Motor Two develoment, the hybrid solid rocket motor that will send SpaceShip Two above 100km (62miles)

No information on the fuel or oxidiser type is given although there is an indication that the fuel was changed after hot fire one. The test logs are fairly bland although some introductory text at the top of the webpage gives some interesting background

Many subscale hot-firings were performed at Scaled Composites between Jun 05 and April 09 to evaluate several different fuels, igniters, injectors, insulators and nozzle configurations, as well as other components and parameters. Based on the results of those subscale firings, the Scaled/SNC team chose a full-scale rocket motor system design and began testing in April, 2009.

 

credit: Lukas Wilcocks/Flight caption: (L-R Nelson, Shelley) One is yet to fly, one will fly it hard to fly in 2010 

At the Royal Aeronautical Society's 30 June 2009 space tourism conference Xcor Aerospace chief operating officer Andrew Nelson and Space Adventures vice president sales and marketing Tom Shelley answered the audiences' questions after each giving a presentation

Go here to download part one and here to download part two of the audio of the Q&A. While I was not allowed to make a video or audio recording of the actual presentations, because audio recordings are supplied to conference attendees with the proceedings, I was told that the question and answer sessions were not included in the post-conference package

credit: Lukas Wilcocks/Flight / caption: (L-R) McCallum, Abrahamsson. Both spaceports have legal obstacles

At the Royal Aeronautical Society's 30 June 2009 space tourism conference Spaceport Scotland Support Group strategic development director Thomas McCallum and Swedish Space Corporation business development manager Mattias Abrahamsson answered the audiences questions after each giving presentations

Go here to download the audio of that Q&A. While I was not allowed to make a video or audio recording of the actual presentations, because audio recordings are supplied to conference attendees with the proceedings, I was told that the question and answer sessions were not included in the post-conference package

credit: Lukas Wilcocks/Flight  / caption: Whitehorn said that UK space law would stop Virgin Galactic flying

At the Royal Aeronautical Society's 30 June 2009 space tourism conference EADS Astrium's deputy chief technical officer Hugues Laporte-Weywada and Virgin Galactic president Will Whitehorn answered the audiences questions after each giving presentations

Go here to download the audio of that Q&A. While I was not allowed to make a video or audio recording of the actual presentations, because audio recordings are supplied to conference attendees with the proceedings, I was told that the question and answer sessions were not included in the post-conference package

Here is video of Swedish Space Corporation business development manager Mattias Abrahamsson speaking to Hyperbola about Spaceport Sweden's future at the 30 June 2009 Royal Aeronautical Society space tourism conference

As well as European Union funded projects that will start later this year such as FAST20XX the Swedish Space Corporation has calculated that Space Exploration Technologies' Falcon 1 could allow the Swedes to launch satellites from their most northern territory without dropping rocket stages onto their neighbours

Video games multi-millionaire Richard Garriott, Space Adventures' sixth space tourist and one of the company's co-founders, spoke to Hyperbola at the Royal Aeronautrical Society's 30 June 2009 space tourism event. He followed in his NASA astronaut father's footsteps, Owen Garriott was a scientist astronaut that was a Skylab crew member and participated in a Space Shuttle mission

Xcor Aerospace's chief operating officer Andrew Nelson spoke to Hyperbola at the Royal Aeronautical Society's space tourism event on 30 June 2009 about the tickets they have sold, the test flight plan for Lynx and related technology development and early plans for an orbital system

The Commercial Spaceflight Federation, whichly recently re-branded from Personal Spaceflight Federation, has released the statement you'll find in the extended portion of this blog post and placed this white paper on its website

In an email to journalists CSF executive director John Gedmark says, "Please see attached for an announcement from members of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation concerning our submission to the White House Review of U.S. Human Space Flight Plans Committee (also known as the Augustine Committee).

The central recommendation of the White Paper, entitled "Commercial Spaceflight in Low Earth Orbit is the Key to Affordable and Sustainable Exploration Beyond", is that NASA should invest in commercial human spaceflight capabilities to the International Space Station.  Without leveraging the resources of the private sector, NASA will simply not be able to afford to meet the twin goals of (a) fully utilizing the Space Station, potentially through 2020, and (b) conducting sustainable exploration beyond Low
Earth Orbit.

We believe this program should be modeled on the success of NASA's existing Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program, which is enabling the development of commercial capabilities to deliver cargo to the International Space Station, based on the principles of fixed-price, milestone-based, competitive awards."

Go through to the extended portion of this blog pot to rea the CSF's press release

credit: NASA / caption: NASA simulation image of the Orion crew exploration vehicle with ATLAS docking adaptor attached in close proximity to the International Space Station's APAS docking port

You could have said Boeing to that answer, after all the aerospace behemoth is to manufacture the Ares I crew launch vehicle upper stage but you would be wrong, and a little cruel considering some of its recent problems, Boeing that is, not the Ares I upper stage

My answer, as it clearly states in the headline, is computer aided design and computer aided engineering. And not for good but for ill

"For ill, how so", you may ask, "that technology is ubiquitous throughout aerospace industry along with finite element analysis and simulation packages galore?"

(You may also ask, why not an Ares picture? Because this rendition of the Orion is the only low res CAD-esque image I have of anything from the Constellation programme)

And you would be right but Hyperbola's argument is that these computer software packages have led to a level of, eh, let's call it "under design", that has led to real world trouble for both programmes. I'm not just talking "garbage in, garbage out"