Soyuz Seats Going to Highest Bidder?


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View from the Soyuz TM-32 carrying Dennis Tito just before docking at station Alpha on April 30, 2001.
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A new Soyuz spacecraft is seen docked to station Alpha on April 30, 2001. Its taxi crew included space tourist Dennis Tito.
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A Soyuz U rocket lifts off April 28, 2001 on the first taxi mission to station Alpha with a three-man crew that includes space tourist Dennis Tito.
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	Soyuz Seats Going to Highest Bidder? By Leonard David Senior Space Writer posted: 05:30 pm ET 03 May 2001 ET

WASHINGTON, D

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Grabbing a tourist-class seat on future Soyuz flights may turn into an enterprising game of musical chairs.

Thanks to the "cash-and-carry" flight of Dennis Tito, customers hungry for a boost up into the heavens are lining up at the launch pad. From rich folk to reality based game show producers, various deals are in play as Russian space officials open up Earth orbit for sky-high prices.

Orbital Bed and Breakfast

While various agencies and individuals are grabbing their Soyuz tickets, the question of where these tourists will stay remains to be answered. One company working to solve the housing problem is SPACEHAB, which is building a module that could serve as a space bed and breakfast.

Tito paid in the range of $12 million to $18 million for his space jaunt. The true figure? Only the high-velocity adventurer and his quick-fingered, calculating accountant know for sure.

But in order for the next person to plop down into the next Soyuz seat headed out of town, a bidding war may not be out of the question.

Mere mortals

Enter Brainpool, the largest independent marketer of TV shows and TV series in Germany, exploiting products via Pay-TV, Free-TV, the Internet, merchandising, print, audio and special events.

Late last year, Brainpool signed an exclusive contract with European aerospace giant Astrium GmbH for the latter to provide a total of seven flights to the International Space Station (ISS).

In cooperation with RSC Energia and Russian space agency Rosaviakosmos, Brainpool travelers will get a leg up into space courtesy of Soyuz boosters.

The entire concept is tagged Space Commander, with contestants put through an array of tests to determine cream-of-the-crop, flight-ready winners.

Each person picked for a space voyage, as highlighted by Brainpool promotional material, "leave this Earth as a mere mortal but return a hero." Brainpool is scripting out a series of 100 "action and emotionally packed" television shows for the project.

According to Brainpool, kickoff date for the effort has been set for September 2001.The first Soyuz rocket with a Space Commander onboard is slated for September 22, 2002, with follow-on flights out to 2008.

A winner lobbed into orbit "will spend the most amazing seven days of their lifeaway from their loved ones and friends, a sunrise every 90 minutes and so much more," Brainpool reported.

Richard Hearsey, a spokesman for Brainpool working at Ronin Entertainment International, the organization promoting Space Commander in London, said the project is moving forward.

"We are still proceeding with Space Commander as before," Hearsey told SPACE.com. "The fact that Tito went up only helps us. I can confirm the fact that we have secured seven flights and can use these as prizes within Space Commander."

Destination: Where?

Yet another entry into the Soyuz seats for sale sweepstakes is Mark Burnett, the creative force behind the Survivor TV shows.

It was Burnett who pitched Destination: Mir to NBC in 2000. That show would have winnowed a group of cosmonaut wannabes down to a winner and boosted to the Mir space complex. The entire process was to have been spread out over as many as 15 episodes.

The program was purported to cost an estimated $50 million. Needless to say, Russia's on-purpose dumping of their aging orbiting outpost also caused an early reentry of the Destination: Mir idea.

Burnett reportedly remains tethered to a Destination: Space show, however, patterned after Survivor. Given the potential for a Hollywood spat turned into strike between screenwriters and major studios, reality-based programming could be perfect fit within a stretch of non-union talent.

Tonight on CBS, in fact, the Survivor 2 show is expected to detail the next "destination" locale for Survivor 3. As the made-for-TV slogan suggests, stay tuned.

Along with CBS, there are rumors that NBC is still poking around the edges of a reality-TV show focused on passenger space travel.

A titanic decision

Then there is the waiting-in-line status of James Cameron, Academy Award winner for his seagoing epic, Titanic.

At a House space subcommittee meeting on Wednesday, NASA chief Daniel Goldin applauded Cameron for holding up any countdown to blastoff that he is seeking, at least for the time being. Both Goldin and the film director apparently see eye-to-eye on waiting until the ISS is more complete and ready for houseguests.

The NASA administrator remains angered about Tito's pay-per-view travels.

NASA in fact now plans to bill the Russians for work lost and time required to make sure that the multimillionaire wouldn't endanger himself or other ISS crew members, Goldin told House space subcommittee members.

Playing the Russian card

Rumbles from Russia suggest that "open seating" aboard an October Soyuz taxi flight to the ISS might be offered. Now in training to fly aboard that mission is France's Claudie Andre-Deshays. She is set to ride in the Soyuz along with two co-cosmonauts, link up with the ISS and stay onboard for 10 days.

Other plans may be in the works, however.

Because Deshays has flown before, there is new talk about dropping one cosmonaut, then sliding her to the middle seat. That would free up one slot. It also pumps, at a minimum, some $20 million into the Russian space coffers by selling the seat.

Furthermore, Russia is taking a hard look at those Brainpool-Astrium seats for the Space Commander show.

High-jacking the price?

Given limited seats, could a bidding war be on the horizon? With few seats and hundreds of millions of dollars swirling about the cash-poor Russian space program, a new form of Russian roulette may be in play.

"I'm not going to say one way or the other whether the seat price will be bid upon or not. But I can certainly say that the demand is there. There are a lot of people out thereand few flight opportunities. So go figure," said Eric Anderson, president and CEO of Space Adventures in Arlington, Virginia, a group who helped broker the Tito ride into space.

Such clamoring for seats is just what space tourism needs, said Thomas Rogers, chief scientist for the Space Transportation Association, also in Arlington.

"The former Soviet Union is teaching the United States free enterprise and competition. And that's what we badly, badly need," Rogers said.

Rogers said that the Russian space program amounts to just 1 percent of NASA's budget. So even at $20 million a ride, that's major cash to them, he said.

"They put up the first satellite. They put up the first human into orbit. And now we're in another situation where the United States has got to catch up," Rogers said.