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NASA Businesses Space United States

NASA Considers Selling Seats on the Spacecraft Used For International Space Station (washingtonpost.com) 75

Posted by msmash from the shape-of-things-to-come dept.
NASA is considering selling seats on the spacecraft that will ferry its astronauts to the International Space Station, offering rides to the public while opening another line of revenue as the agency attempts to broaden its appeal [Editor's note: the link may be paywalled; alternative source]. From a report: On several occasions, Russia has flown wealthy individuals who paid millions for the ride to space. And a trio of private companies backed by billionaires, is also looking to fly tourists out of the atmosphere. But except for a couple of rare exceptions, such as Christa McAuliffe, the teacher who was killed when the space Shuttle Challenger exploded in 1986, NASA has not allowed private citizens on its rockets. "Just like in the early days of aviation, with barnstorming, these initial activities will help build the infrastructure and the foundation that can lead to future innovations that, frankly, we cannot imagine right now," said Michael Gold, the general counsel of Maxar Technologies, who is leading the advisory council's policy reform effort.

The proposal, backed Friday by a NASA advisory subcommittee, is still in the nascent stage, and is part of moves by the agency to better insert itself into the public consciousness by working with the private sector. The proposals would have to be approved by the entire advisory council and then forwarded to NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine. Friday's meeting comes two months after Bridenstine announced he was standing up the committee, and tasking it to look at how the agency could better partner with industry. He said then that he wants NASA and its astronauts "embedded into the American culture." On Friday, he reiterated the point, saying: "The reality is, we're in a new era now."
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NASA Considers Selling Seats on the Spacecraft Used For International Space Station More

NASA Considers Selling Seats on the Spacecraft Used For International Space Station

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  • Want to widen it's appeal? How about a lottery? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Rick Schumann ( 4662797 ) on Monday November 19, 2018 @02:04PM (#57668934) Journal
    If NASA wants to promote spaceflight to the general public, how about also having a lottery to give one seat away? Pending someone being physically fit enough (and mentally stable enough -- don't need someone losing it in the middle of launch or in zero-G) to withstand it, of course. Also think of it this way: astronauts are highly trained physically for spaceflight. The data you'd gather from people closer to 'average' would be priceless.

    • The only issue with this (which would be awesome) is that the winning ticket would be taxed as winnings income. Given that the trip would be worth multiple millions of dollars in value, the winner would probably have to auction off the seat just to pay the tax.

      So a rich guy gets to go either way. BUT some random guy becomes a millionaire AND NASA gets funding for their science.

      WIN-WIN-WIN. Let's do it.

      • Didn't mean to imply a lottery in the sense of 'you pay for a ticket'. Also I'm sure for something on the Federal level like this, we could come up with an exception to that tax anyway. ;-)

        • Pay for a Ticket Lotto actually makes sense. Every can purchase a raffle ticket for $10. NASA will no doubt sell a several million with a little bit of smart advertising and they will be able to fund a big portion of their launch -probably as much or more than they would get from selling a seat directly.

          • NASA will no doubt sell a several million with a little bit of smart advertising

            Fun fact, NASA cannot by law "advertise". They can educate, but not advertise.

        • When NASA is getting into the space tourism business, and possibly running lotteries, it is time to stop and ask some questions. Is this really something the government should be doing?

          Rather than branching out into new and weirder lines of business, perhaps we should consider leaving space tourism and launch services to private businesses, and refocus NASA on science and exploration. You know, those non-profitable things that deserve to be supported by the taxpayers.

          • NASA's business is doing science.
            They have a budget.
            If they can find clever ways to get more science funded with the budget they have they should.

            If that means selling seats or lotto tickets for seats on a glorified (and extremely dangerous) carnival ride to fund more science, then they should do that.

            • NASA's business is doing science.

              No. Only a tiny fraction of their budget is spent on science.

              If they can find clever ways to get more science funded with the budget they have they should.

              This is the EXACT OPPOSITE of what they do. Most of their budget is spent on bloated, wasteful, and politicized contracts for hardware that has nothing to do with "science".

              If you actually think the SLS has any hope of generating "profits" that can be redirected to planetary science, you are completely delusional.

    • to give one seat away? Pending someone being physically fit enough

      Can you even imagine the outcry? Official Federal government space trip lottery tickets for sale, no fatties. How many no-no's does that tick off... Non-ADA compliant... body shaming... probably someone would even make it out to be racist.

      • It's a safety issue; someone with an underlying medical condition that otherwise isn't life-threatening in a normal average life could have someone die during launch or during the flight, and what do they do then? You speak of 'public outcry', but just imagine for a moment what the optics would be like if some civilian died during the flight? There'd be all sorts of accusations of gross negligence, lawsuits, demands to Congress to cancel the space program, and so on, and of course massive amounts of hyperbo

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Megane ( 129182 )
        That's actually why this is a non-starter. On the other hand, I think it could work as a reality show, with local competitions to select the final contestants. They're also cheap to produce, so those who are saying profits should somehow fund NASA could have it right there. Right? Remember 'The Right Stuff'? That was almost a reality show right there!
    • Why would we want to give such a prize to one of the deplorables?

      • Why would we want to give such a prize to one of the deplorables?

        Or the Libtards as well!

        Shit - no one is good enough to go into space. Shut it down and build a wall (Dyson sphere) around earth to keep aliens out!

        • More like 'keep the human infection from spreading throughout the galaxy'. :-(
          Remember, there's damned good reasons why starfaring alien civilizations don't contact us openly, and all of those reasons are our own damned fault. :-(

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by rtb61 ( 674572 )

      It is a lottery but you have to be rich enough to afford to buy a ticket. So you pay for price and then attend training, staying straight and being responsible for your actions, fail they keep the money and you do not fly, pass and you get to play lottery whilst staying in training, maybe not the first available flight or the next or well, it depends how many ticket buyers versus how many seats available when.

      Of course NASA should be commercialising space, space flights, orbiting hotels, and a Lunar escape

  • On what spacecraft? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Enigma2175 ( 179646 ) on Monday November 19, 2018 @02:11PM (#57668998) Homepage Journal

    Doesn't NASA need a spacecraft that can fly to the IIS before selling seats on it? They don't currently have vehicle that can go to the IIS. Are they selling seats on the SLS, which might get cancelled after spending billions? Or are they selling seats on the Soyuz, Dragon or Dreamliner, which they don't own?

    • "...which might get cancelled after spending billions?"

      This is NASA's insurance against that very thing.

    • NASA has to sound corporate-ish to make the current administration happy, or at least less grumpy. I expect the walls of ISS to be full of spam posters soon: "In space, everyone can hear how great GEICO is".

      Ridicule aside, perhaps the commercial angle can be made to work, but it also has the potential to go sour as profits and science may have to fight over the same "space".

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by bblb ( 5508872 )
      They pay the same for the launch regardless... if they have extra room to sell as payload, they can do whatever they want with it.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Kjella ( 173770 )

      Even if the SLS ever flies it's obviously not going to be used for ferrying people to the ISS, so selling seats it is. Though if it was actually profitable I bet SpaceX would pretty soon partner with Bigelow for a private space hotel or just launch something of their own, a single Falcon Heavy launch should suffice to launch a pretty big single module space station. Even though you'd probably run out of volume first in a LEO launch I'm sure there's a way to make some variation of a telescopic fishing rod or

    • Doesn't NASA need a spacecraft that can fly to the IIS before selling seats on it? They don't currently have vehicle that can go to the IIS. Are they selling seats on the SLS, which might get cancelled after spending billions? Or are they selling seats on the Soyuz, Dragon or Dreamliner, which they don't own?

      It's all part of the new commercialization approach. Create idea for product, sell product, ?, profit.

      The Kickstarter campaign should be interesting.

  • You can have any color you want free (Score:3)

    by WillAffleckUW ( 858324 ) on Monday November 19, 2018 @02:15PM (#57669038) Homepage Journal

    But the Space Force patch for your uniform will still cost $2,000,000.

    • But the Space Force patch for your uniform will still cost $2,000,000.

      The USSSF had to cover Gary McKinnon's extradiction request somehow.

  • Ya know, like sending Christa McAuliffe up on a Space Shuttle. WCPGW?

    • Especially since Christa McAuliffe was supposed to have a phone call from President Reagan during his State of The Union speech to celebrate a teacher in space and the space shuttle's 25th launch. Never mind that NASA had a study that predicted a shuttle disaster as 1 in 25.

  • your tax dollar at work (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    i'm glad we gained insight into the respiratory cycle of frogs in 0 G though

  • ... buy a seat?

    I sure as hell ain't taking it home with me and you can bet yer ass I'm not gonna ride in it.

  • No. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 )
    it will end up being subsidized with taxpayer dollars for billionaire jaunts. Just like all those airports in the middle of nowhere that just happen to be next to some rich donor's summer villa.

    Give me universal healthcare, a living minimum wage and a jobs guarantee and we'll talk about your subsidized rides to space. Until then no more free money for billionaires' hobbies.

    • No! (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Give me tech and research to get to Mars, to produce food efficiently and to learn how to cure disease - even if billionaires fully pay their way (with a healthy 2-1 ROI bill).
      Until then no more free handouts to people demanding jobs, free healthcare and then mandated wages because they're speshul snowflakes and deserve everything because they were born on earth - and not say wildlife, wilderness untouched by human scum who don't want to learn, don't want to work but happily want to wear the latest Nikes a

  • This is sad. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Gravis Zero ( 934156 ) on Monday November 19, 2018 @02:45PM (#57669260)

    Due to the constant under-budgeting by congress, NASA has been reduced to offering carnival rides for the rich. NASA is supposed to be about science. This is shameful and reflects poorly upon our nation.

    • If the carnival ride pays for science, what's wrong with it? Regardless of public funding being sufficient or not, extra revenue to fund the science is always a good thing.
  • It's well past time for NASA to make efforts to move their public image into a more prominent and popular role. They're constantly under budgeted largely because the general public really doesn't know or care much about them or what they do. The best way to change that is through publicity or a new cold war/space race... Selling seats certainly seems like a preferable alternative to a sputnik redux.

  • Good, NASA needs some independence (Score:5, Interesting)

    by DanDD ( 1857066 ) on Monday November 19, 2018 @03:32PM (#57669564)

    If NASA is to survive as the ensuing space age develops, they'll have to become independent from the erratic whims of Congress. I'm not sure that's possible, but I can't fault them for trying.

    Unless NASA sells their interest in the ISS to a private entity, anything launched from the US and authorized to dock to the ISS will be a NASA flight. It might be contracted from Boeing or SpaceX, but it will be NASA coordinated and controlled in cooperation with the Russian and EU partners. Thus, if NASA does sell seats to ISS, it will almost certainly not depend on SLS.

    Spaceflight will always be risky, and there will be failures. The recent Russian Soyuz launch failure highlights this, and ironically, is positive publicity for good engineering. The Soyuz rocket blew up, but the Soyuz capsule returned safely, along with the crew. The SpaceX Crewed Dragon Capsule and Boeing CST-100 Starliner will have similar launch abort systems and good survival capability. A lot of unfortunate lessons were learned from the shuttle program, and comparisons of a well engineered capsule or Dreamchaser-type system to the shuttle are unwarranted.

    So far the most promising commercial space venture to replace or compete with the ISS seems to be Bigelow Aerospace and their commercial space station [wikipedia.org]. Their BA 2100 [wikipedia.org] expandable module is truly massive, and interestingly seems to fit with launch capabilities of the SpaceX BFR rocket [wikipedia.org], as well as the SLS, it it gets built.

    I can't see NASA ever owning launch capability to compete with the likes of SpaceX or Blue Origin, but I can see them owning and controlling destinations in Earth orbit. For commercial operations NASA may evolve into, or merge with the likes of the FAA for safety and regulatory oversight.

    Things will get really interesting when commercial space operations can leave all that behind and stake their claims in on the Moon and in lunar orbit, and of course, on Mars. I don't think NASA will be in the drivers seat by then. They've been hobbled by Congress for far too long and were never designed to be a commercially competitive entity.

  • NASA's budget 2018: ~$20B
    DoD budget 2018: ~$600B

    Once the crowing achievement of the US, is now under consideration to be little more than an expensive bus ride for the wealthy as a means to generate income.
    I'm surprised NASA hasn't resorted to a bake sale for fundraising :|

    Though I suppose if their budget keeps getting slashed, they may ultimately resort to such a thing.

    Astronaut cookies anyone ?

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