Virgin Galactic just reopened its waiting list to fly to space, and you can put your name down for a $1,000 deposit.
Through Virgin Galactic’s One Small Step Program, you can pay a refundable deposit to get in line for the next round of personal space travel. Your deposit gets you to the next level of the registration process called One Giant Leap, where you will be in the priority group for an offer of a future reservation once they become available.
While $1,000 is merely a drop in the bucket to reserve a seat to space, you’ll have to come up with more than $250,000 if you actually plan to follow through with Virgin Galactic’s One Small Step program.
Six hundred people secured confirmed spaceflight reservations when the first registration slots opened back in December 2018, and Virgin Galactic said the demand was so high, the company decided to release more seats.
“We have been greatly encouraged by the ongoing and increasing demand seen from around the world for personal spaceflight. One Small Step allows us to help qualify and build confidence in our direct sales pipeline, as well as to ensure that those who are most keen to make reservations, are able to do so at the earliest opportunity,” said Stephen Attenborough, Virgin Galactic’s Commercial Director, in the press release.
Virgin Galactic’s space tourism spacecraft, the SpaceShipTwo Unity, will take passengers for a 90-minute roundtrip into space 62 miles above the Earth. Passengers will experience breathtaking views of the Earth below, and even a brief period of weightlessness.
Digital Trends reached out to Virgin Galactic to find out a timeline of when people who sign up today could expect to fly to space. We will update this story when we hear back.
Aside from Virgin Galactic, SpaceX is also working on public space tourism with Space Adventures missions set for late 2021 or mid-2022. The Space Adventures missions will consist of up to five days free-orbiting in space; passengers will have to complete a few weeks of training beforehand. SpaceX’s Crew Dragon space capsule will be used for the private spaceflight missions that will be able to hold up to four people.
SpaceX hasn’t announced pricing yet, but previous Space Adventures flights have reportedly cost around $30-$35 million, so Virgin Galactic’s program is probably in more people’s budgets.
