Private space travel on the horizon

Elon Musk’s SpaceX made history last weekend when its Falcon 9 rocket launched NASA astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley into low-earth orbit on Saturday (early Sunday, Indian time), on their way to the International Space Station (ISS), in a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule that chased the ISS in orbit and docked with it 19 hours later. For America, the launch was historic because it was the first time in nine years, after NASA ended the space shuttle programme, that astronauts were launched on an American rocket from American soil. It must have rankled the world’s leading space power that for nine years, it had been dependent on Russia to launch its astronauts into space. The SpaceX launch was also important because the feat came, much like the achievements of the Apollo moon landing programme in the 1960s, amid social turmoil across America and the loss of its global sheen.

The launch itself was spectacular and, like all SpaceX launches, it was made into a spectacle that people all over the world watched. Until SpaceX came along, one could utmost watch a rocket launching from its pad, an awesome sight as it is, but as it rose skywards, it would become a smaller and smaller dot and disappear completely within a few minutes. SpaceX came along and put up cameras on its rockets and crew module. For the first time last weekend, the world watched not just the rocket throughout its flight into space and the rocket stages falling back gracefully and precisely as SpaceX recovered them for reuse, but also the astronauts in their crew capsule throughout the ascent and then as they manoeuvred it to the ISS and docked with it.

For the whole world, too, SpaceX’s feat is important and exciting. It is the first time that a private space company has launched astronauts into space, and that, too, on a high-risk mission that required a precise rendezvous in orbit. By evolving and mastering reusable rocket technology, SpaceX has been able to dramatically bring down the cost of space launch per kilogram of payload. By demonstrating its ability to safely launch humans into space – and it will hopefully bring them back home safely -- it has brought the prospect of private space travel closer. It will add momentum to the rise of the space industry, which is already happening in America, with states and
city governments -- from Colorado to California to Florida -- competing with each other to draw space industries to them. Sooner or later, entrepreneurs and governments in India, China, Europe and elsewhere will follow suit.