Travel to Space

Virgin Galactic

At the forefront of off-world tourism, Virgin Galactic, the space arm of Richard Branson’s multinational conglomerate.

Launched in 2004 in an attempt to help solve some of our world’s major challenges and to eventually become the ‘Spaceline for Earth’. Hoping to launch its first commercial orbital (within the earth’s orbit) flights in the first quarter of 2021 the company already has 600 passengers signed up (at a cost of $250,000 per person) including A-listers Justin Bieber and Leonardo DiCaprio.

Founded in 2002 by innovative-tech entrepreneur Elon Musk with a goal of reducing space transportation costs in order to eventually, enable the colonisation of Mars.

Space Exploration Technologies have made history on several occasions, most notably in March of 2020 when its flagship ‘Dragon’ became the first private spacecraft to take humans to the International Space Station. Now offering flights for private passengers, including a number of rideshare options, Space X is one of the only companies to offer both suborbital (beyond the earth’s orbit) and orbital flights, with the first lunar orbit flights set to take place in 2023.

One of the major players in commercial space travel, Blue Origin was launched in 2000 by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

With a mission of ‘building a road to space’ through developing and manufacturing reusable launch vehicles.

In Jan 2021, the company’s recently-upgraded New Shepard craft completed a return trip to the Earth’s Orbit with a dummy crew on board, making an important step towards full commercial space flights, which are expected to begin towards the end of this year at a cost of around $200,000 per person.