Niche travel: space tourism

The space race has picked up speed again with a spate of competitions to enable ordinary folk a chance to blast off with the millionaires. There is even a reality show in the pipeline, the first prize in which is a seat on Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic, now firing on all cylinders with a possible Christmas Day launch.

Already the price of a ticket has headed skywards, having started out at $200,000 per seat it ahem, skyrocketed to $250,000 a pop.

Given the increasing level of interest in space, with Iron Man Elon Musk talking up the idea of colonising Mars, insurance giant Allianz busy preparing space policies – just in case – and rival operators such as XCOR, Space Adventures and Space Expedition Company waiting in the wings, the only way is surely up.

The latest company to offer a trip to space takes an even more novel approach. Arizona-based World View Enterprises is promoting suborbital balloon rides to an altitude of 30km (another 70km and you’d be in outer space). Travel is in a capsule that rises under a giant helium balloon and then glides back down to Earth afterwards.

Passengers won’t quite be qualified to call themselves astronauts afterwards but they will see black space and the curve of the world beneath them. What’s more, for a brief moment, when the capsule jettisons its balloon, they will feel a sensation akin to weightlessness.

Tickets for these trips, which are expected to launch commercially in 2016, are $75,000. At least the prices are coming down.

worldviewexperience.com