Shatner joined Star Trek in 1966.
5 years after Yuri Gagarin went to space.
3 years before America went to the moon.
This is with Blue Origin where Jeff Bezos auctioned off a ticket to space for 28 million this summer and is planning to start charging $100,000 a ticket in the next decade for fast space travel.
Cool thing to think about here.
The first US space mission was with Alan Shepard in 1961 and the total cost was 400 million.
3.6 billion today
Star Trek cost $190,000 an episode in 1966.
1.35 million today
The first season had 29 episodes.
39.2 million in today’s money.
This is why what Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson & Elon Musk are doing matters.
We went from the first person sent into space costing .8% of the federal budget to a point sending a person to space cost less than making a season of Star Trek.
And it’s only getting cheaper from here.
Bezos has invested 10 billion into space travel and his mission had an estimated cost of 100 million for a 4 minute trip to space. The Shatner mission will apparently be much less.
When Richard Branson planned Virgin Galatic to have $250,000 space flights in 2012, 600 people paid and reserved seats with names such as Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt, Tom Hanks, Katy Perry & more joining.
It’s been a long time and proof of that is Brad & Angelina bought tickets together, as well as Russell Brand & Katy Perry, but it’s happening faster now.
But the beauty of this is it shows how big the space market is.
Richard Branson reserved 600 seats in only a few weeks.
Jeff Bezos came out saying Blue Origin has 100 million in orders coming in.
Comparison on this, Mount Everest.
800 people climb Everest every year.
Cost average $42,000 for a guide.
The climb takes 2 months.
If there’s a market for almost 1,000 people a year to pay tens of thousands of dollars to spend two months in the freezing cold, there’s going to be a market to be shot up into space for $100,000.
And this helps everyone.
If there is this luxury market for a million wealthy people globally to pay $100,000 for a 4 minute suborbital trip to space, what investment does this lead to?
Does the market go orbital?
Do people want longer trips?
How much does a lunar trip cost?
This potentially 100+ billion dollar space tourism market will have a trickle down in technology where the investment to meet these demands will hit everyone’s phone, car, hospital and more.
The same way Apollo did!
We’re calling this the billionaire space race, but the tech this is going to lead to for everyday people will help billions of people.