Stop being a proposal in the air. The Orion Span company, based in Houston (USA) hopes to launch the “first luxury hotel in space”, dubbed ‘Aurora Station’ in 2021 and have its first guests as early as 2022.
The first luxury space hotel will measure about 13 meters long X 4 meters wide and the wealthiest tourists will have a new orbital destination in a few years if the plans of this startup go as they wish.
“We will launch the first affordable luxury space hotel,” said Orion Span founder and CEO Frank Bunger, who presented the idea for Aurora Station at the Space 2.0 Summit in San Jose, California.
Mind you, ‘affordable’ is a relative term. A 12-day stay aboard the Aurora Station could cost from 9.5 million dollars. However, it is true that it is considerably less than what orbital tourists have paid in the past.
From 2001 to 2009, seven citizens made a total of 8 trips to the International Space Station (ISS), paying an estimated price of between $ 20-40 million each time. Not suitable for any pocket.
“There’s been innovation around the architecture to make it more modular and simpler to use and have more automation, so you don’t need to have EVA [extravehicular activities] or spacewalks,” Bunger commented of the luxury space hotel. .
Some of the leading engineering experts involved in the construction of the Aurora Station space hotel have helped design the International Space Station in the past ; they are manufacturing the hotel in Houston and developing the necessary software to operate it in the Bay Area.
Aurora Station will be about the size of a large private jet cabin. It measures 13.3x 4.3 meters) and has a pressurized volume of 160 cubic meters. For comparison, the ISS is 109 meters long and has a pressurized internal volume of 916 cubic meters.
The private outpost will orbit at an altitude of 200 miles, slightly lower than the ISS, which is about 400 miles above Earth on average.
Aurora Station will accommodate four guests and two crew members; in all likelihood, the expert staff will be ex-astronauts, according to the company. Most of the guests will be private space tourists, initially at least, but Orion Span will be available to a variety of clients, including government space agencies.
The space hotel hopes to grow over time , if all goes according to plan. As demand grows, Orion Span will release additional modules to link to the original outpost.
“Our long-term vision is to sell real space in those new modules. It’s what we call a space condominium. So whether it’s for living or sublet, that’s the vision of the future: creating a long-term sustainable human habitation in orbit. it comes down from Earth, “clarifies Bunger.
More competition
Orion Span is not the only company to follow this path. Other companies, such as Axiom Space and Bigelow Aerospace, are also aiming to launch commercial space stations in low Earth orbit in the coming years to meet anticipated demand from space tourists, national governments, researchers, and private industry. Other private players, such as Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin, will start their business operations soon.
Individuals wishing to become space tenants will undergo a three-month training program, culminating on board the space hotel.
Image credit: Orion Span
