Space Tourism

Space tourism is the recent occurrence of tourists paying for spaceflights, principally for personal agreement.

As of 2008, space tourism opportunities are limited and luxurious, with only the Russian Space Agency providing transportation. The price for a flight brokered by Space Adventures to the International Space Station aboard a Soyuz spacecraft is now $30 million. Flights are fully booked until 2009.

Among the primary attractions of space tourism are the matchlessness of the knowledge, the adventure and awe of looking at Earth from space (described by astronauts as extremely passionate and mind-boggling), the experience's notion as an fashionable status symbol, and various advantages of flimsiness. The space tourism industry is being targeted by spaceports in numerous locations, including California, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Florida, Virginia, Alaska, Esrange in Sweden and Wisconsin, as well as Singapore and the United Arab Emirates. Some use the term "personal spaceflight" as in the case of the Personal Spaceflight Confederation.