Branson-Bezos race marks the start of a ‘decade of space’

NEW DELHI: Someday, they will be remembered as “5 minutes that started the decade of space”. In a span of 10 days, billionaires Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos will cross the space frontier some 100km up in the sky. They will be the first amateurs to do so in privately designed and owned spacecraft — signalling that anyone can do it. And while they might spend only about 5 minutes each in zero gravity, they have the world’s attention because human space flight will now be at the centre of all space activity for both scientific and commercial projects.
Domain experts have already labelled it a “decade of space”, as all spacefaring nations, including India, are drawing up ambitious plans to touch down on other celestial bodies.
Billion-Dollar Dreams
In June, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos announced he would take a trip to space with his brother Mark on July 20. It’s been a longish wait because back in 1996, he had anticipated space travel for everyone to be “some years off”.
Bezos has worked on his dream longer than his more glamorous rivals Elon Musk and Branson. He created his company Blue Origin before Musk’s SpaceX and Branson’s Virgin Galactic, but Musk put a rocket in space in 2008, and Branson put an astronaut there first, in 2018.
And now Branson has beaten Bezos to space, too. On July 2, the British magnate took to Twitter to say he would go up in his ship on July 11, more than a week ahead of Bezos’ planned flight.
Notwithstanding the hype, their race is more than about shuttling tourists to the low orbit. The industry is also abuzz with the Mars race between Musk and Bezos.
Not The First
Branson and Bezos are not the first space tourists, though.
Recreational space travel first happened on April 28, 2001, when American businessman Dennis Tito became a “space flight participant” — as he likes to call himself — on board the Russian Soyuz TM-32. He paid $20 million to spend 7 days at the International Space Station.
South African millionaire Mark Shuttleworth stayed at the ISS in 2002, followed by American businessman Gregory Olsen in 2005. Another American entrepreneur, Anousheh Ansari, became the first woman commercial traveller — fourth overall — in September 2006.
Future Bright For Space Tourism
More than 70% of the $400-billion global space economy is already commercial activity. With multiple firms — Blue Origin, Virgin Galactic, SpaceX, Orion Span, and Boeing — racing ahead with tourism-enabling innovations, experts see a bright future for space tourism in next decade.
Global financial services firm UBS expects space tourism to be a $3-billion market by 2030. While US firms are in the lead, old rival Russia has revived its space tourism programme. Glavkosmos, the agency that trained Indian astronaut-elects for the Gaganyaan crewed mission, is confident of sending its first batch of space tourists by 2023, as reported by STOI earlier. China too has been talking about tourism as part of its long-term plans.
Speed Boost For Air Travel
While only the rich will be able to afford space travel for years to come, the aviation industry is abuzz with talk of high-speed travel via space.
For instance, Musk’s plan to fly Shanghai-New York in just 39 minutes may indeed become a reality sometime this decade. In fact, the 2019 UBS report says long-haul airplane flights — over 10 hours in duration — would be “cannibalised” by point-to-point flights on rockets. It also says that by 2030, high-speed travel via outer space will represent an annual market of at least $20 billion and compete with longdistance airline flights.