Dr. Shyam Narayan Singh
Assistant Professor (Contractual), Institute of Tourism & Hotel Management, Pt. Ravishankar Shukla, University, Raipur (CG)
ABSTRACT:
In general sense, tourism is act of travel for the recreational purpose from usual workplace. Still, people are travelling earthly places for tourism purpose. Since the beginning of human civilisation human beings have always been curious to know deciphering of space and travel into space. It was on 4 October, 1957, when the Russian Sputnik opened up the doors of prospects for mankind to fulfill their dream of space travel. Finally the day came, when the first manned space travel became a reality in 1961. The paradigm of space travels for recreational or pleasure purpose emerged during 60s, but the it took a long time to become reality, because space travel used to be for scientific purpose only. 28 April 2001 was the day when space was opened for general people for pleasure, to enjoy the adventures and excitements of space instead of scientific uses. This means that, now space tourism isn’t a hoax; it is reality. In general understanding space tourism can be defined as “the public member buys a ticket of spaceship and travels into the space for pleasure and returns back safely on earth after enjoying his holiday’’. The space tourism has enormous economic potential. It has a wide range of commercial aspects.
KEY WORD: Tourism, Space Tourism, Sub-Orbital, Orbital
RESEARCH OBJECTIVE:
To promote the general awareness about Space Tourism among the common people for maximum utilisation of space opportunities.
INTRODUCTION:
Since the dawn of civilization human beings have been dreaming of space travel. Humans are by nature curious, when they observe the sky, they wanted to explore the universe in the same manner as they wished to fly when they observed birds. Sputnik on October 4, 1957, 1 opened up the prospects of realising the man’s long cherished dream to reach space. Since then, the first manned space travel became a reality in 1961. Space science grew rapidly. Very soon, eight years later, the big leap for mankind took place when the first man- Neil Armstrong stepped on moon, Armstrong proclaimed, “that’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind” since then several space missions have been completed successfully.
In a modern age, the concept of “space travel for recreational purpose” was first time introduced in 1967 by Enthusiasts Ehricke and Barron Hilton.2 Since then, there was no real endeavour undertaken to make space tourism reality. This was because, space was strictly the domain of national government funded agencies and professional Astronauts and their development effort was war induced. Meanwhile, conceptually space tourism was firmly growing in academic and scientific research domain.
Before the first genuine commercial space tourist, in the nineties, space tourism was gaining popularity, At beginning of 21st Century Mr. Dennis Tito became the first space tourist has entered the International Space Station in 28 April, 2001 at a ticket price of 20 million dollar which he paid to the Russian Space Agency.3 Thereafter, space tourism came out of the realms of science fiction role and quickly became a serious contender for research and industry resources.
The concept of space tourism is innovative in nature, which is growing with the increasing developments in technologies, facilities, and more exploration in space. Space tourism is the notion that paying passengers will have the opportunity to travel beyond the Earth’s atmosphere and experience orbital flights, prolonged stays in rotating space hotels, and as well participate in research, entertainment and even sports while in outer space.4
In simplest term Space tourism means “Ordinary public members (not astronaut or cosmonaut) buying tickets and travelling beyond Earth’s atmosphere for pleasure (not scientific purpose) and safely returning. Generally, on the basis of travel destination, Space Tourism is divided into two categories- “Sub-orbital” and “Orbital Space Tourism”. In Sub-orbital tourism category, Spacecraft would take a tourist to an altitude of about 100 KM, (see figure-1) above the earth sea level on a trajectories path (mean, a path followed by a vehicle); the spacecraft will probably shut off its engines well before reaching maximum altitude, and then coast up to its highest point. During a few minutes, from the point when the engines are shut off to the point where the atmosphere begins to slow down the downward acceleration, the passengers will experience weightlessness and see the Earth’s curvature and the hollow black space around. Several private companies activily working on commercial passenger suborbital spaceflight, such as Virgin Galactic, XCOR, Armadillo Aerospace, Blue Origin and Masten Space Systems are taking an interest in sub-orbital tourism.
Figure 1: Sub-orbital Space Tourism, Courtesy Xcor, Aerospace.
In Orbital Tourism, passenger is flown to space using an expendable or reusable launch vehicle able to reach orbital speed (about 8 km/s) and possibly to attach to an orbiting habitats like International Space Station (ISS) with living quarters . Passenger is then able to stay for a few days or weeks in the orbital facility5. The orbital experience is totally different from that of sub-orbital in the sense that one would experience zero gravity throughout the stay; orbit provides the maximum Earth coverage, choice that would allow travellers to see a diversity of terrestrial features.
Figure 2: Typical Orbital Tourism
Today, Space Tourism is reality, all of the technologies needed to carry passengers in space are available, however, the difficulty lies in achieving this in a cost effective way. A number of technological issues must be resolved before orbital space tourism can become a profitable business.
Due to the global economic crises, presently the world needs new capable industry, which is the full of new economic possibilities. The space tourism has enormous economic potential. It has wide range of commercial aspects, which would be necessary for the sustained establishment of industry. Established tourism industry will create global network of supportive services, such as manufacturing industry, infrastructure industry, ground operations, travel consultant, hotel industry, insurance, food, entertainment, fashion, advertisement, media, and health industry, etc. It is clear that when space tourism would be able to operate as a regular commercial industry, it will have a profound beneficial effect on the global economy.
REFERENCES:
1. Crompton, Samuel Willard (2007): “Sputnik/Explorer-I: The Race to Conquer Space”. Publishing by Infobase, New York (USA), P.2
2. Hilton, Barron (1967): “Hotels in Space”, Based on Preprint AAS 67-126, AAS Conference Proceedings. (Also Available at http:// www.spacefuture.com/archive/hotels in space.shtml
3. Joanne, Randolph (2003): “Dennis Tito: First Space Tourist”. Rosen Publishing Group, New York (USA), P.5
4. O Barrett (1999): “An Evaluation of the Potential Demand for Space Tourism within the United Kingdom”, Bournemouth University, Dorset, England. P.6 (Also Available at http://www.space future.com/archive/an evaluation of the potential demand for space tourism within the united kingdom.shtml)
5. OECD International Future Programme (2005): “Space 2030 Tackling Society’s Challenges”. P. 304
Received on 15.11.2012
Modified on 25.11.2012
Accepted on 03.12.2012
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