In Space, No One Is Overweight

Commercial flights will have decidedly sub-NASA training rules for their wealthy tourists

- Justin Bachman

The so-called space billionaires—Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson, and Elon Musk—imagine a day when people will live and work up there, gradually transforming humanity into a multiplanet species. The current step in that direction is the space tourism industry, which, starting as soon as 2018, will let civilians escape Earth’s grasp for a few minutes in exchange for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

We’re well past the days when every astronaut needed Chuck Yeager-caliber right stuff, but the scientists and other civilians NASA has sent to space so far still had to undergo the agency’s formidable training. Because the government is leaving it largely to the commercial space companies to work out their own regimens, far less physical or psychological preparation will be needed for the wealthy people on these spaceflights. While research suggests average humans will be able to handle the physical stresses of millions of pounds of thrust powering an ascent that reaches thousands of miles per hour, Bezos’ Blue Origin, Branson’s Virgin Galactic, and Musk’s SpaceX are entering uncharted territory.

“It’s not like just walking on an airplane and putting on your lap belt and reading a book or falling asleep,” says Dr. James Vanderploeg, chief medical officer for Virgin Galactic LLC, which could begin launching suborbital flights next year. And the bigger question, according to the latest research, is whether people who aren’t real astronauts or fighter pilots can handle the psychological stress of leaving the planet strapped to a rocket.