SpaceX Live Updates: The Inspiration4 Crew Embarks on a 3-Day Mission to Orbit

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/09/15/science/spacex-launch-inspiration4

by erikcw • 5 years ago

25 25 5 years ago

rpmisms4• 5 years ago

Well, we're all here for a moment in the history books. This is crazy. Space travel is now affordable for the rich, not just the hyper-wealthy.

alphabettsy2• 5 years ago

What a time to be alive!

That said, I’d like to live in your world where having an expendable $55 million per seat is merely rich.

notfried• 5 years ago

The trip was paid for by one person, so it's a $220 million personal expense. For a 3-day trip, this has to be the biggest expense per unit of whatever by anyone, ever.

rpmisms4• 5 years ago

Source on the price?

RotaryTelephone• 5 years ago

Don't fret, the poor will be herded up into space to mine the asteroids eventually.

mensetmanusman• 5 years ago

We can’t even herd them to pick crops any more, I doubt we won’t have robotics ready by then.

pfdietz• 5 years ago

For our robot overlords (did I say overlords? I meant protectors.)

908B64B197• 5 years ago

Only in America things like this can happen.

A whole industry bootstrapping itself to make semi-conductors doubling every 18 months, going from exotic, mission critical hardware to commodity; SpaceX is doing the same thing with flight hardware. Contrast that with previous generation engines (the RS-25 comes to mind) with a sticker price of 125 millions... per engine! [0] Meanwhile we're looking at ~60 millions per seat on this flight. Incredible.

https://spacenews.com/aerojet-rocketdyne-defends-sls-engine-...

kevin_thibedeau• 5 years ago

You used to be able to visit a space station for $20M. This price outstrips the inflation rate since 2001.

CraftThatBlock• 5 years ago

Do you have a source on this?

imglorp• 5 years ago

If nothing else, at least St. Judes will make $200 million. They're a good charity.

Since we're talking about stupidly rich people, Bezos makes more than that every day.

Animats• 5 years ago

At least they're in orbit, not just a suborbital fight.

Bezos spent 10 minutes in space. Why bother? Al Shepard did that in 1961. NASA did a second launch with Gus Grissom. Those were just tests before they tried orbiting. After that, nobody bothered again until 2004.

Gustomaximus• 5 years ago

"Mr. Isaacman has declined to say how much he is paying for this orbital trip, only that it was less than the $200 million he hopes to raise for St. Jude Children’s Hospital with an accompanying fund-raising drive."

Is this some way to write the trip cost off as charitable deduction? Spend $50m sending self to space as 'advertising' and if you dont raise more via fund raiser its oh well we tried?

Edit: Thought it fair to add, this may well be a genuine attempt to raise money for a good cause with good intent. I'm a bit jaded from seeing people around offices spend money on expensive holidays and tying it to a cause where they raise fractions of what is spent on the holiday. My feeling is if they cared for the cause they'd skip 'hiking across country X' or whatever and donate the money while having a cheaper holiday elsewhere. So my bias is towards being a bit sceptical when it come to people trying to raise money for charity via expensive personal experiences.

shadilay• 5 years ago

This happens all the time. Throw a big charity fundraiser to raise your social profile and get a tax write off for it. Let someone else pay for the actual charity.

SpaceX Live Updates: The Inspiration4 Crew Embarks on a 3-Day Mission to Orbit

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