Space Hotel Projected To Open In 2012

Link To News Story

Now...this is just cool. Granted the price tag is way too high for the average human...even the average upperclassman...but this is definitely an indication that we are going to start colonizing space. The fact that this is being done through the private sector is a plus, in my opinion (despite a lack of international regulation regarding space occupation), as it is potentially going to result in affordable prices as the industry starts getting its' space feet (though I doubt it will be affordable to me in my lifetime).

I think it is absolute hilarity that they are planning on opening in 2012...a conspiracy reference for our crowd and likely has absolutely no relation to the Mayan Calender. Hows that for the 2012 doom sayers? Instead of the world ending...it is expanding!!!

So...anyone want to reserve a seat and then leand me their reservation...

For something so revolutionary, I find their website to be extremely... childish?

And not to sound like a dooms dayer but its strange that it falls on that date. Guess its perfect timing for the rich snobs to save their own arse. Hm, well see I guess

reply to post by MemoryShock

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This sounds really cool! Sign me up....I just have to start saving and playing the lotto now If I had Steve Jobs or Bill Gates money I would be signing up for this in a heart beat.

S&F

That is definetly a hefty price tag. But its definetly cool for anyone who has the money that has always wanted to go to space. I dont think I would want to have to crawl around my room, but to see the sun rise 15 times a day would probably be a lovely sight.

80 minutes......... that sounds a lot like the velocity of the ISS, at what...... about 18,000 MPH? sweeeeeeet! So, perhaps if this project can somehow, miraculously, get constructed, tested, and open for business in less than 3 short years, we'll have a new terrestrial object to watch for in our early morning and night skies.

I'd kinda hate to be the first visitors to this "floatell" ....... not that I could even begin to fianance it. How wonderous it would be.... it's hopeful. I dare to hope that myself and m'Bride might be in orbit before our time on Earth has passed.

Great find, thanks!

I'm wondering what will be on the menu...and gawd help me if I have something else to add to my bucket list...getting drunk in space...

reply to post by MemoryShock

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I was thinking about the menu too. Imagine the shock on the faces of folks who've paid beaucoup bucks when they discover their beef bourguignon comes out of a tube! ha! Also, champagne will be flat. Clearly, the resort will be gravitationally challenged, if guests are expected to velcro themselves to and fro about the place.

I'd think that would become a VERY annoying sound very quickly -- the constant rrrrrrrrrrrrippp/thawack of moving from place to place.

Getting drunk in space..... well, I confess to having been a tad buzzed on my 35th skydive............ or was it the 36th? I'm pretty certain it was in the 30s somewhere. ahhhhhhhhh, the simplicity of youth.

If it's a Multi Billion dollar project.........And they are only charging 3 million euros......

How long until they make a profit ????

Never ?


I mean how many people would it take before they started making money?

reply to post by LucidDreamer85

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I think at this point it is a matter of jump starting the industry. Since it is corporate funded, I imagine that in order to turn a profit they need the industry to be functional...and a good rationalization for spending so much money, in my opinion, would be to be in on the ground floor of an industry that will certainly be a major one in the next few centuries...barring catastrophe.

So I can definitely see it...and as well...there may be some other benefits...such as an advertising bonanza that is loaded with good will and innovation for Virgin...

I wonder if this "multi-billion" dollar space hotel will stay in orbit long enough to turn a profit? Even at 3 million Euros a pop, they would require lots of customers to break even. It seems like this thing would fall out of orbit before they could get close to that dollar amount. If they got a method of keeping it up there for longer than I am anticipating, then why not use that same technology on the ISS?

Am I the only one who can't grasp how they're going to have it up and running by 2012? I've always associated any space technology or space construction with very logn completion dates. But less than 3 years away? Seems a bit unrealistic to me

Anyway if this is legit, I honestly can't wait for this hotel to start operations. Of course, I won't be able to actually go there because I'm not exactly a millionaire, but maybe eventually the cost will be brought down with the invention of easy access to space like the space elevator and the construction of more space bases and the moon base O:

Or you know, if disclosure happens, maybe the ETs can give us some teleportation technology to get up there easy =p

Nope...not the only one. It's mentioned in the article that there are some concerns regarding how realistic it is to be done by that date...but if more than one operation is going at once...it may actually happen within a couple of years from the projected opening...

I'm afraid that this sort of project is unfeasible at the moment. You can't even get a commercial aircraft from prototype to fully certified and operational in this amount. Let alone construct and launch an orbital hotel and service with an as-yet fictional spacecraft.
People will probably try to argue with Spaceship One and Two, but the differences in required DeltaV and the energy that needs to be bled off during re-entry are on another order of magnitude. That's why real spacecraft (orbital) are so expensive and difficult to build and operate as opposed to something that is merely suborbital/ballistic. Think Mach 3 versus Mach 29 or thereabouts. I am involved with aerospace and I think of Burt Rutan as a demigod. If Spaceship One/two is the best he can do with a timeframe of many years and large amounts of cash, then I call this BS or worse, fraud.

After viewing the image of the final project, and what it will look like...

It is the most terrifying creation ever to made by the hands of man. Seriously, a frightening way to spend a relaxing vacation.

Oh, I forgot to mention that we still don't know /at least in the "white" world/ how to build a craft capable of withstanding reentry, that would have sharp edges in the same places as shown in their promo picture.

Wouldn't that be the greatest Birthday present ever? 3 nights in space.

Like some of you I cant see it being ready in 3 years, saying that however the Virgin space port in being built now isn't it? ready for paying customers just for a short flight, and it seems to me that Richard Branson does not jump into things blind folded, he usually has an idea if it's going to have at least a chance of working.

Getting up there is the biggest obstacle, the rest has been tried and test by the Russians and the Americans, depends on them sharing the secrets and plans, a money spinner for both countries I would guess, but if there was an emergency and it was someone really well known up there, who is going to go get them back? so many variables so we have been led to believe for disaster.

I have often thought of this as being like being cryogenic-ally frozen waiting for a cure, not going to happen when I am alive, but I said that when they said I could watch TV being beamed into my home from space, and having a telephone I could fit in my pocket as light as a feather (not literally), and watching movies from a little card as big as my thumb nail, yet here they are (watching star trek on a 3 gig flash card)

I so envy my Kids.

Horse poop!

The building my company is building here on Earth started a year ago, and won't be finished until 2011. And a company that doesn't even have a way to get up into the atmosphere themselves is going to launch construction in space.

Nice idea. By 2012? Not even close to likely.