Bang, zoom… to the Moon!

Ever wanted to go to the Moon? You can! All you need is $150 million and the Virginia-based firm Space Adventures will take you on a Soyuz spacecraft.

Eric Anderson, the chairman of Space Adventures, recently announced the firm had sold one of two contracts for their upcoming flight, though he declined to name the would-be astronaut. For the $150 million price tag the customer gets to enjoy an Apollo 8-like flight plan, leaving the Earth and circling Moon. Working with the Russian Space Agency, Space Adventures has already launched a number of private investors into space and has plans to add more trips, both around the Moon and to the International Space Station. The firm is also expanding, working with space and aeronautic firms like Boeing to seal future deals using other spacecrafts.Space entrepreneur Jeff Manber explained some nations may be interested in tickets, since it is much cheaper to buy a ticket than developing a free-standing national space program. “It’s not a lot of money if you look at what we spent on Apollo, or what the Soviets spent to get around the Moon,” he said “We’re talking about a whole new era coming along, so that’s really cool.”Commercializing space travel and exploration opens many doors, Manber explained. It allows for more affordability and opportunity.“It’s entirely possible you could have couples wanting to go around a Moon,” he added. “There’s a lot of stuff you can do in the back of a Soyuz it’s like the back of a big pick-up truck. It’s history in the making.” Next, the commercialization may find ways to spend even less to land on the Moon, saving national tax payers millions.“If you just got some dough you can get to the Moon,” Manber commented. The continual development of privatized space travel should inspire everyone to rethink the future of space travel and exploration.