There have been space tourists before, but they’ve gone with professional astronauts. The mission is called Inspiration4. The launch is at the end of this year at the earliest.
The trip has already been sold to 37-year-old billionaire Jared Isacman. He is the founder of Shift4 Payment Service. In his spare time he is a fighter pilot and mountain climber.
Isaacman chooses three US citizens to accompany him. They receive astronaut training, which includes learning to operate their spacecraft and getting used to being weightless. After launch, they will fly a few circles around the Earth, after which their capsule will sink into the sea in a controlled manner and will be captured again.
Richard Branson
By the mission, Musk is ahead of his main competitors. Richard Branson has been involved in space tourism for years. His company, Virgin Galactic, planned its first paid flight into space in 2009, but is still conducting test flights.
SpaceX first brought humans to the ISS space station last year. It was the first time the company had been successful. Until then, only the Soviet Union, Russia, the United States and China had managed to put humans into orbit.
