I think that I am alone among my friends, in that I would take a trip to the International Space Station if I had the money. I don’t like to fly (odd because my wife is a pilot) and I don’t like heights. I think that space flight, the way it is now depending on cash strapped Russian rocket facilities, is very dangerous.
I would go to space in a heartbeat, even if I thought it might be my last heartbeat.
Buzz Aldrin is setting up a Space Lotto system. Buy a ticket and instead of winning a few paltry millions, you get to go to space! I’ll buy a few tickets. At least now you know what to get me for Christmas.
Former Apollo astronaut Buzz Aldrin is drawing up plans for a lottery-like contest, with space experiences for prizes, in hopes of making orbital spaceflight available to more than just wealthy entrepreneurs.
Note: Read Heinlein’s Have Spacesuit, Will Travel. It’s about a kid who enters a soap contest where the first prize is a trip to the moon. He wins a surplus spacesuit, which he restores. When he meets alien space pirates, he’s ready and the spacesuit saves his life, and the Earth. It is in my top ten favorite Science Fiction stories and would make the best movie of all the Heinlein novels. If you haven’t read it, it is in your local library. I also recommend the audio version, which is a full cast recording and done very very well.
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I wonder what the odds will be to win a Spaceflight Raffle? There is an up and running project called eSpaceTickets that has ODDS of 350 to one to win a flight to the edge of space and two zero gravity flights. The eSpaceTickets site does not look like a “pie-in-the-sky” site… least when you win you get go today than get in line and wait for years. Here is the link http://www.eSpaceTickets.com