Ten years ago, US multi-millionaire
Dennis Tito became the world's first-ever space tourist.
He is said to have paid $20m for his
eight days in space.
Mr Tito blasted off on 28 April 2001,
but only after a struggle to get anyone to take him - the US space agency Nasa
refused on the grounds that he was not a trained astronaut, so it was the
Russians who facilitated the trip.
To date, only six people have followed
in his footsteps - paying for a ticket to orbit in space.
“Start Quote
I am one of the happiest humans alive ”
End
Quote
But 10 years on, the lure of making
space tourism more accessible to the masses is just as strong.
Virgin Galactic hopes to take
fare-paying passengers into space in around two years time, and a Russian
company has even announced plans for a hotel in space.
On the tenth anniversary of the flight,
Dennis Tito reflected on his eight-day holiday in space for BBC World Service.
Dennis Tito
There was absolutely no fear. I was so
excited and so were my crew mates.
We were going to be in space, and we
thought of nothing else, but the success of that mission.
So there was absolutely no apprehen
sion
- it was just a really good, euphoric feeling that finally the day had come.
It was not a shuttle, it was a space
capsule; we were literally elbow-to-elbow.
The countdown began, and it went on
schedule to the second.
It was a little surprising when lift-off
occurred - I thought it would be much more rigorous; you could barely feel it, and
you could not hear it.
When I witnessed a launch from the
outside, even a mile away, there was a huge sound.
But we heard nothing of that within the
space craft.
'Like
flying'
As we lifted off and the fuel began to
burn, the vehicle accelerated and it kept on accelerating, and then you felt
just a gradual build up of G-forces.
Eight minutes and 50 seconds later, you
experience your last of the three-gs, and then zero-gs when the engine shuts
down - that is the most spectacular moment of the entire flight.
At burn out you become weightless; there
are pencils that are hung from strings in the cabin, and at orbit insertion,
those pencils start to just float.
“Start Quote
It was a sense of completeness - from
then on, everything is a bonus”
End
Quote
And then looking to my right, out of the
window, I could see the blackness of space, I could see Earth, and the
curvature of Earth, and the sight of Earth from space was just spectacular.
I cannot ever duplicate that euphoric
feeling that I had at that moment.
For me it was a 40-year goal. Often
achieving a major goal in life occurs
slowly, but this was instant - it was
just at that precise moment.
It was once we got out of the space suit
that we were able to float around and experience weightlessness.
It is really extraordinary, because
there is nowhere on earth that we - or any of our ancestors in the entire
history of evolution - experience that.
It was a wonderful experience; the
feeling of floating is just unbelievable. Moving around is not difficult and
you learn very quickly.
When we were on the International Space
Station we had more room - you would push off from one area, very gently, and
you would fly to ano
ther area.
It was like flying, and that was a lot
of fun!
Vivid
Earth
It took two days of orbiting the Earth,
16 orbits a day, before we caught up with the station.
There were three crew members who were
there for about two months as part of the long-term crew, so they don't see
many human beings, and they welcomed us with open arms.
I think we have a much better view of
the Earth from the International Space Station.
The port hole that we would actually
look out at the earth was through the floor, so I was always looking at earth.
Then we had some port holes that looked
out to the side, and we could see the edges of the Earth - so we had two
different kinds of views.
We would go from one to the other, and I
would spend most of the 45 minutes - which is half of one orbit - and be either
videotaping the view, or just sitting for 45 minutes, peering out, listening to
opera, and just enjoying the experience.
The images are vivid in my mind. I
continue to enjoy it every day!
It went very quickly and probably the
most disappointing thing for me was after a total of eight days in space, I had
to return to Earth.
I would have happily stayed up there for
month
s!
For me, there was very little transition
from the space flight to Earth.
Within 48 hours I was actually back to
my running - I ran a couple of miles.
With Nasa, there was a strong feeling
that my flight shouldn't take place.
And I think it's somewhat understandable,
it was the first truly private space flight.
And I think that they were concerned,
number one, about me being a private citizen; and number two, that my age may
not have qualified me.
They had probably some reason to be
concerned.
Space
future
I hope that tens of thousands of people
can experience what I experienced, for 5% of the cost.
I believe there will be a time, it may
take 10 or 20
years, where the cost for flying in orbit might be as low as a
million dollars in today's money.
A million dollars is certainly a lot of
money, but there are many millionaires in the world today, and I know people
that would spend their last penny to have this experience.
I often thought that if I did spend my
last penny, I could li
ve on social security for the rest of my life and still
be happy, because I'd achieved what I wanted to achieve.
It was a sense of completeness - from
then on, everything is a bonus. And the last 10 years, everything since then,
has been just extra.
And I think I am one of the happiest
humans alive because of that.
source : BBC
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