Richard Branson: millions can become astronauts
- By Jack Preston -
- Sep 19, 2012
Richard Branson has spoken of the ‘explosion’ in space travel which he expects to come to fruition over the next few years, as private space travel ventures such as Virgin Galactic begin to gather pace.
"It's going to be an explosion of people having had the chance to go into space and enjoy the marvels of space travel," explained the Virgin Group founder to USA Today.
"In the past 30 years, only 500 people have been to space. I suspect in the next 30 years there may be something like five million people who will have had the opportunity to become astronauts."
As well as tourists enjoying the wonders of space, Branson expects more routine travel to take place with people "popping out of the Earth's atmosphere and straight back down again", enabling trips between destinations such as New York and Sydney to be reduced to a two hour flight.
"In the next 30 years there may be something like five million people who will have had the opportunity to become astronauts..."
21 years after first trademarking the Virgin Galactic name, Branson believes that next year will see the world’s first commercial spaceline take its first passengers into space, resulting in a sustainable and continued service.
"I'm absolutely certain that there will be hundreds of thousands - if not millions - of people who will opt for (spaceflights), once the price gets to the right level," stated Branson.
"We've already got more people signed up to go on Virgin Galactic than have been up in the history of the last 60 years into space. We'll put all those people up in our first year of operation."
If you’d like to find out more, or book your flight, head over to the Virgin Galactic website.
By Jack Preston. Content Executive. Tweets at @JackPressedOn
