Summary
June 19, 2009: New Mexico celebrated it's Ground Breaking Ceremony for the first commercial space port, near the small city of Truth or Consequences (also called "T or C, NM"), which will bring tourism and jobs to the poor desert state of New Mexico. This historical project could lead to more private individuals creating space travel vehicles in the future of our planet, instead of leaving that task solely to Government funding or large corporations. Richard Branson, owner of Virgin Galactic, and rich British tycoon, is heading up this project with the New Mexico State Government, and is investing more than $300 million just to create a new space launch system. The Space Port itself is only a $198 million project. Virgin Galactic is expecting to charge $200,000 per 2-hour ride into space once everything is completed, around 2011. Already they have around 300 pre-booked flights. (The math says that Virgin Galactic could be sitting on $600 million right now if they have been taking payment in advance!)
See Also
New Mexico
Scaled Composites SpaceShipOne
With All Systems Go Sheboygan Shoots For The Moon With Spaceport
Source
Game and Story Use
- Your players could find themselves in space on one of these tourist craft when something goes horribly wrong.
- A heroic team could use this as a way to fight alien invaders.
- They could load up their special gear in back packs and go on a tourist trip just as a premise to getting into space for the mission.
- The bad guys could hijack someone important and hold them hostage in a 2-hour negotiation from space, where the consequences of non-compliance are grave (crash landing).
- Crooks could be using this as a scam to take people's money and then not actually deliver on the flights. This could be good for an investigative campaign.