Ever since spaceflight was a thing, it has been used by governments to assert dominance against other countries, even the moon landing project was done solely for this purpose
But this is changing.
While government agencies like NASA and ISRO are doing all their great things, they are far more boring to the audience, because they are interested in science-based projects like satellites
On the other hand, companies like SpaceX, Rocketlab, Virgin Galactic, and Blue origin have been working on something much bigger- Space tourism.
And its not just a competition on who makes better and safer rockets for billionaires, its a race to push the boundaries of what humanity can do, which will inevitably (albeit slowly) make space available to the common people.
Now lets talk about the rockets. Fun stuff!
First, lets clear out the confusion between 'space' and 'orbit'
Space is just everything beyond the boundary of about 80 kms. Its a lack of atmosphere, but not a lack of gravity. Gravity doesn’t stop by reaching space. At an altitude of 100 km, mass is still being pulled by Earth’s gravity with nearly the same force as at sea level. Specifically, gravity still pulls with 9.4 m/s2 of force, as opposed to the 9.8 m/s2 at sea level.
Both, Blue Origin’s New Shepard and Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo will launch more or less straight up. After about two minutes of acceleration for New Shepard and one minute for SpaceShipTwo, the engines will cut off and both vehicles will coast up, where they will hit their peak altitude or apogee, and then fall back down to Earth. At the moment the engines cut off, passengers will begin to feel weightless. Passengers will feel weightless until the spacecrafts begin to hit the atmosphere again and start to experience aerodynamic drag.
At apogee, these vehicles have virtually zero horizontal velocity. They are practically completely stationary for a brief moment in time. If they now were to try and stay in space by getting into orbit, they would need to be traveling at orbital velocities, roughly 28,000 kmh sideways, which is about 8 times faster than their peak velocity during ascent. A quick rundown on orbit vs suborbit can be found here.
Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo
Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic is a suborbital tourism launch company that is not to be confused with Virgin Orbit. Virgin Orbit is a small satellite rocket company, which launches their LauncherOne rocket from a Boeing 747 called Cosmic Girl. At one point they both were part of Virgin Galactic, but are now separate entities. Virgin Galactic currently has one system composed of SpaceShipTwo and its carrier plane, WhiteKnightTwo.
There’s also a newer production-ready version called SpaceShip III (formerly SpaceShipThree). It is virtually the same spaceplane as SpaceShipTwo, but hasn’t flown by the time this article has been published.
The overall shape and design of Virgin Galactic’s spaceplanes is super unique, featuring pneumatically tilted tails and horizontal stabilizers. The twin tails of the rocket plane have a so-called carefree re-entry profile, which takes inspiration from a badminton shuttlecock. This carefree re-entry profile is a passively stable design that provides a large amount of drag and makes the vehicle want to re-enter belly down every time, even in the case of it re-entering upside down.
The most interesting part about these vehicles is that humans are 100% in control of them. There is no autopilot and no fly-by-wire. The pair of pilots control the vehicle directly through electronically controlled trim at supersonic speeds, and cable and rod linkages at subsonic speeds. To control the orientation of the spaceplane in space, they have 12 cold gas thrusters. Cold gas thrusters use compressed air and are a very simple and effective way of controlling the attitude of a vehicle when there is no atmosphere present. They can control pitch, yaw and roll, with a total of 6 pairs of thrusters for redundancy.
Customer Experience
(How you will feel if you end up in SS2)
Virgin Galactic pays close attention to detail inside the vehicle and ensures the customer the best possible experience by including 16 cameras. Customers will not have to fiddle around their cameras, helping them to live in the moment and focus on the experience. There are seatback displays to help staying up to date with every phase of the flight. The seats are also dynamic and change their angle to maximize comfort and safety during the different portions of the flight. Furthermore, the seats also feature self retracting seat belts to help passengers getting out of their seats quickly during weightlessness. There are 17 windows spread across the whole spaceplane with halo edges so passengers can easily get a hold on them.
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But chances are, you are not a billionaire (Like us) what a bummer, does it mean we probably wont go to space? NO. Virgin galactic is currently offering lottery tickets to space. Yes, you heard that right
Conclusion
Space has given us all the chance to dream: Of beauty and wonder. Of great adventures. Of being part of something bigger than ourselves. And now… with space tourism slowly becoming a thing, We will get to experience that beauty. To be one of the only people to view earth from space, live. Experience 0-gs. These are inspiring times, and with the moon and mars landing coming in this generation, this is an essential step there.
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