The space agency has teamed up with Bigelow Aerospace, a US space technology startup company that manufactures and develops expanding cosmic modules. Bigelow has three Space Act agreements whereby they are the sole commercialise of several of NASA’s key expandable module technologies including the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module (BEAM) which docked to the Space Station on April 16, 2016. The company is planning to also market and operate two B330 inflatable space habitats in 2021, the B330-1 and B330-2, which will be 330 cubic metres wide and capable of housing up to six people in each.
However, this plan is far from the sci-fi dreams of owner Robert Bigelow.
Amazon Prime’s “Tomorrow’s World” revealed why there is a growing market for space travel.
The 2018 documentary explained: “Images of astronauts in a weightless environment have raised people’s interest in space.
“Today, lots dream of doing the same, flying off to have an unrestricted view of Earth from space.
Space tourism gives us a market, so for the next step, you need to build space hotels
Al Globus
“A decade or two ago, Dennis Tito paid the Russians $20,000,000 and they flew him to the International Space Station.
“Not because he was going to do experiments, not because he was an astronaut picked by the Russian government or the American government, but because he paid for it.
“He had a great time, and since then, six or seven additional people have gone up, one of them twice, and these are the first space tourists.”
The narrator continued, explaining some of the other options for experiencing space-like environments.
She added: “For now, only the rich can afford to experience weightlessness at the ISS.
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“Others buy some minutes of extreme sensation aboard the A300 0G, at the French National Centre for Space Studies.
“For €6,000 (£5,200), they can play at being astronauts while the plane spins around in southern France.
“But space tourism is only just beginning, recently a few companies have joined alongside national agencies.
“Their aim is to democratise space travel, and even turn it into a holiday idea.”
However, Al Globus, member of the National Space Society revealed how Bigelow and NASA could be about to change things.
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He said: “There’s been a variety of studies and market surveys indicate something on the order of 400,000 people would want to go into space a year.
“Space tourism gives us a market, so for the next step, you need to build space hotels.
“So you need food, air, water, bathrooms, waste, you have to solve all these problems in order to have hotels and Bigelow Aerospace has plans to fly a space station – a space hotel.”
The narrator added: “This has been named BEAM and the idea is to attach another inflatable module to the ISS.
“This will allow further living space and test the credibility of a blow-up hotel in space.”
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