Do You Have What It
Takes to Go Into Space? (Probably)
With pioneering companies like Space
Adventures, Virgin Galactic and XCOR vying to launch average folks skyward, it
seems like almost anyone can have the right stuff.
By Alexandra Wolfe jn the Wall Street Journal
AMERICA’S FIRST CORPS of astronauts, known as the Mercury Seven,
had it pretty rough back in 1959. Selected from hundreds of elite pilots, they
had to endure a battery of grueling tests: running on treadmills for hours,
blowing up balloons repeatedly to gauge their lung capacity, being exposed to
extreme heat, vibration and loud noises. None could weigh over 180 pounds or be
taller than 5-foot-11. And they needed to have logged at least 1,500 hours of
flying time in a traditional aircraft.
The bar has since
lowered drastically, especially for ordinary citizens hoping to catch a ride
aboard the commercial “space-tourism” flights that have either launched or have
plans to do so as soon as early next year. Just ask the 700 ticket holders who’ve paid up to $250,000 to ride with Virgin Galactic 50
miles above the earth, or the 300 who have signed up for a similar offering by
XCOR (at a cost of $95,000). Overweight? Probably not a problem. Heavy smoker?
The sky may still be the limit. Even if you think you haven’t got the right
stuff, you might. It could just take a bit of training to get you there.
Surprisingly, the
baseline medical requirements for commercial space travel are lenient—and
that’s true whether you’re taking a “suborbital” flight that barely leaves the
earth’s atmosphere (as Virgin Galactic and XCOR’s flights will do) or going all
the way to the International Space Station (a trip offered by a company called
Space Adventures).
According to a Virgin
Galactic spokesperson, the “vast majority” of the general population will be
able to fly with the company, even those with “heart disease, diabetes, high
blood pressure, joint replacements, lung disease and other conditions,”
assuming proper precautions are taken. XCOR participants must pass a basic
physical exam, like that required to acquire a pilot’s license, but the company
welcomes all, as long as passengers fit in the seat and can open the spacecraft
door in case of an emergency on the ascent or descent. (You also can’t be heavier
than 250 pounds if you want the XCOR spacecraft to reach its maximum altitude
of 100 km) And although the FAA requires that commercial spaceflight
participants be 18 or older, neither service has a maximum age limit. Virgin
Galactic has provisionally cleared customers in their 80s.
The much more involved
Space Adventures’ Orbital Spaceflight program, which lets civilians hitch a
ride aboard the Russian Soyuz to spend 10 to 14 days in the International Space
Station, is equally inclusive in its approach. Although passengers are screened
for health issues that would be difficult to treat in space, “most people in
good health will qualify for spaceflight,” said Space Adventures president Tom
Shelley. And there is a precedent for civilians making it safely to space and
back again. The company took its first passenger, Dennis Tito, then 61, up to
the space station back in 2001. Seven others have since then, including Guy
Laliberté, founder of Cirque du Soleil. British soprano Sarah Brightman, next
in line, is scheduled to go up next year.
Besides Space
Adventures, Virgin Galactic and XCOR are the other main ventures focused
specifically on taking passengers to space. ( Elon Musk ’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos ’s Blue Origin are concentrating on
commercial payloads). Virgin Galactic has done test flights and plans to take
passengers up in 2015. XCOR says its test flights will begin early next year,
with passengers going up as soon as next winter.
Space travel is not
for the faint of heart, however. Even during relatively short suborbital trips,
your body is subjected to extremes during ascent and re-entry. The rate of
acceleration can cause blackouts, because the blood rushing from your head to
your feet makes the heart pump faster to keep you conscious. On re-entry, the
Virgin Galactic flight briefly hits 6 gs—or six times the earth’s gravity.
(XCOR’s flight tops out at 4 gs.)
All three services
provide guidance on how to mitigate this. When passengers buy a ticket with
Virgin Galactic or XCOR, they’re put in touch with a trainer. Richard Searfoss,
a former NASA astronaut and retired Air Force Colonel who now serves as XCOR’s
staff trainer, suggests doing abdominal exercises so passengers will be better
able to engage their core on re-entry. Passengers are taught “straining
maneuvers”—a technique that involves tensing your muscles to help keep blood in
the chest area, so it can get pumped up to the brain. He also recommends doing
cardio exercises to ensure that you don’t have trouble breathing under the g
loads.
And then there are
simple movements—like maneuvering around the spacecraft cabin—that most people
aren’t accustomed to. “You’re crouching to climb into the spaceship and
stretching to get out of your seat and doing new motions that you normally
don’t do in regular terrestrial life,” said Beth Moses, who was once the
International Space Station assembly manager and is now Virgin Galactic’s chief
astronaut trainer. She advises future passengers to stretch regularly before
the flight.
Both Virgin Galactic
and XCOR’s ticket price includes three days of training, during which
passengers take an aerobatic flight that will subject them to g-forces similar
to those they’ll experience in the spacecraft. Both companies recommend future
passengers ride in a centrifuge flight simulator in advance to get a sense of
how the heightened forces will feel.
Space Adventures’ much
more involved Orbital Spaceflight program has a rigorous training program to
match. Passengers spend roughly six months embedded with astronauts in the
Russian Federal Space Agency at the Gagarin Research & Test cosmonaut
Training Center in Star City, Russia.
Esther Dyson, an
entrepreneur and investor in a handful of space-tourism companies including
XCOR and Space Adventures, elected to be a “backup cosmonaut” (current cost: $4
million). In addition to daily classes on “space plumbing” and “space
medicine,” she recalled spending two nights in the snowy woods—an exercise
meant to prepare her for an emergency landing in winter. She and two other
cosmonauts had to pitch a makeshift tent and build a fire, using only an ax and
the silk from their parachutes.
Ultimately, the
physical preparation is as much about comfort as it is about survival. “We’ve
been doing a lot of work to demonstrate that physical fitness is not a
necessity,” said Dr. Rebecca Blue, a flight surgeon currently employed by
Virgin Galactic. Dr. Blue, as an assistant professor at the University of Texas
Medical Branch at Galveston, led a study independent of Virgin Galactic that
found even people with common medical problems—including asthma, emphysema and
back and neck injuries—could safely withstand the stress of commercial space
travel. “We want people to take this opportunity to really kind of focus on
health and fitness as a lifestyle choice, so you enjoy the flight and don’t
simply tolerate it.”
Don’t have $95,000 to
blow on a ticket to space? Here are four ways to get an out-of-this-world
experience here on earth
Take a Spin in a
Centrifuge. To get a taste of the
4 to 6 gs that you’d experience during a spaceflight, ride in the Phoenix
Centrifuge, at the National Aerospace Training and Research Center, in
Southampton, Penn. It’s a 25-foot rotating arm with a space-cabin cockpit
attached to the end. The NASTAR Center offers a two-day foundational course in
suborbital spaceflight, which includes skills training and time in the
centrifuge, for $3,000. nastarcenter.com
Lose Some Weight. You don’t have to travel to space to
experience weightlessness. Zero Gravity Corporation offers weightless flights
in a modified Boeing 727 that is flown in a series of parabolic paths. As the
plane makes its way over the top of the parabola, passengers experience
weightlessness for 20- to 30-second intervals. Each excursion includes 15 of
these maneuvers. Flights cost $4,950 and depart from locations throughout the
U.S., including Cape Canaveral and Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.; Las Vegas, Nev.; and
San Jose, Calif. gozerog.com
Go to Basic Training. The U.S. Space & Rocket Center’s Adult
Space Academy, in Huntsville, Ala., offers a number of ways to experience the
rigors of space travel. A flight simulator, built inside a mock-up of the
cockpit of the space shuttle, gives you the experience of commandeering a
spacecraft, while the 1/6th Gravity Chair is basically a spring-loaded seat,
suspended from the ceiling, that gives you the feeling of bouncing along the
moon. There’s also a Multi-Axis Trainer that spins the sitter in various
directions to mimic the “tumble spin” an astronaut might experience during
reentry in a space capsule. The Academy costs $499 for a three-day program,
$599 for four. spacecamp.com
Ride a 4-G Roller Coaster. Although even the fastest roller coasters
don’t subject the body to the pressure an astronaut experiences, you can get a
4-g experience at some amusement parks. Try Batman: The Ride, at Six Flags
Fiesta Texas in San Antonio (sixflags.com), to name just one.
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