Space tourism may be taking off, but critics not taken with its aims

Since the summer, space tourism companies have taken passengers on brief trips above Earth and have garnered a lot of attention for doing so, in part because of the people they took with them.

Rivals mount rockets the same month

Billionaire Jeff Bezos went to space in July, along with three other passengers, aboard a Blue Origin spacecraft. The company sent four more people to space last Wednesday – including William Shatner, best known for playing Star TrekCaptain James Kirk.

“What you have given me is the most profound experience,” Shatner told Bezos after his trip to space.

And yet, for all the coverage Bezos received, he wasn’t even the first billionaire to go to space this year – Richard Branson arrived first, on a Virgin Galactic flight that carried six passengers, nine days before. its competitors Blue Origin.

“The whole thing was just magic,” Branson said after the flight.

And the planet?

But not everyone applauds. Ryan Katz-Rosene, associate professor in the School of Political Studies at the University of Ottawa, said these recent space tourism efforts and the competition to claim their achievements are “completely deaf to the realities of sustainability challenges. That the planet is facing. .

“I don’t think we should be spending so much focus, effort, attention and money on private space travel,” he said.

Yet Philip Metzger, a planetary physicist at the University of Central Florida, says this type of space tourism could end up helping to solve problems at home. Astronauts and others often say that the experience of seeing Earth from above has left them with a renewed appreciation for environmentalism.

Metzger predicts that having more people view Earth from above will result in a greater mobilization of “resources and talents to protect the Earth.”

WATCH | When Shatner really went to space:

The science behind William Shatner’s space travel

CBC Quirks and Quarks host Bob McDonald talks to Andrew Chang about what William Shatner went through on his brief trip to space. 2:32

Possible advantages

Chris Hadfield, the retired Canadian astronaut, sees where Prince William and like-minded critics are going – acknowledging that there is some justification for their concerns about issues on Earth.

But he said the push to explore is what inspires the discovery of new ideas and new technologies – including some of the satellite tools we now use to measure and observe parts of our planet and the problems it faces.

“This technology doesn’t just appear instantly,” said Hadfield. “You have to inspire people, they have to develop it.”

As for the future of a larger world of space travel, Hadfield said “it opens up so many opportunities and I think that’s the part worth focusing on.”