It’s my turn to write blog again and I found many interesting news in BBC. The most attractive for me is “Virgin Galactic's spaceship makes solo flight” by Jonathan Amos.
This article is about the first solo test flight of the first commercial tourist spaceship in the world that owned by Vergin Galactic enterprise. The spaceship will be taken off by an aeroplane and fly back to the Mojave Air and Space Port. The fare for each person on this short travel above atmosphere is $200,000 (£126,000) and 370 customers have paid for their exciting tour. It’s only 25 minutes for the entire flight.
This news makes me think about big step of our age. We start with short travel in space and it can be have more time and more spaceship or even have more competitive in this business. It seem to be extravagant to use 6 million baht for 25 minutes travel, but let’s think about mobile phone in last 20 years, it’s both expensive and unnecessary to our live. Just twenty years, things are changed until we can’t believe that you can talk and see your partner’s face without any delay signal. It’s because of people have dreams and try to reach them. I admire Sir Richard Branson, the British billionaire that decided to start this project even though it’s made by business vision. Who knows, one day we might have a shopping mall or amusement park in space.
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References
"Virgin Galactic's spaceship makes solo flight" by Jonathan Amos. (2010, October 10) BBC News. Retrieved October 12, 2010 from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11511604
I agree with Nu's idea. Nobody knows spaceship maybe close up to our lives like mobile phone. In my opinion, it is a good experient that the airline gives their customers to touch experient in space, and this travelling shows that people try to make their dreams such as travelling in space come true and it is effective.
ReplyDeleteLike Gift, I also like Nu's comparison of space flight with mobile phones. When I bought my first mobile about 15 years ago, it was very expensive, very complicated, with copies of my passport and various forms being required, and it was big, ugly and heavy. It was actually very useful for me at teh time, but it was also a pain to carry around. And then I lost it! That was a real pain.
ReplyDeleteToday, anyone can walk into a shop and buy something much better in every way for a couple of thousand Baht! My current mobile is nothing special, but it contains more computer power than the computer I had 15 years ago, and it does a lot more than make phone calls.
I'm not planning any space trips just yet, but who knows what the world will be like in 15 years.
And on the topic of technology, Nu's post also reminded me of another one I saw recently about Google's development of self-driving cars. I saw the same thing reported in the NY Times today, so I might blog it myself tomorrow.