Originally published on October 23, 2013
For $75,000, space tourism company World View will be launching passengers 30 km into space by air balloon for a two-hour view of the earth's curve.
Although the balloon will attain more than twice the altitude reached by conventional airplanes, passengers will not experience weightlessness in the stratosphere. "Outer space" is 100 km above the earth's surface, just beyond the reach of gravity.
In each trip, six passengers and two pilots will be transported in a pressurized capsule. The interior is similar to the cabin of a private jet, and passengers are free to wander within the space.
The capsule will be transported by a 1.1 million cubic-metre helium balloon, made of a material as thin as laundry bags.
"It's a very thin material by necessity to get you so high. That's where the technical risk lies. The risks of decompression of the spacecraft or life-support systems failures are pretty small. We've got lots of redundant systems and we can return to lower altitudes pretty quickly," company co-founder and CTO Taber MacCallum told Reuters.
The ascent is expected to take 90 minutes, with the balloon moving at approximately 100 metres per hour until it reaches peak height. After gliding in space for another two hours, the balloon will disengage from the main capsule, which then drifts back to earth, guided by a parafoil.
The capsule must also meet safety requirements for manned spacecraft orbiting earth set by Federal Aviation Association.
"At [their] intended altitude, water and blood boil, and an unprotected person would rapidly experience fatal decompression," the FAA wrote in a letter to the company based in Tucson, Arizona.
The initial launch is expected to take place at Spaceport America in New Mexico.