Space tourism is upon us.

SpaceX will launch a crewed mission beyond the moon for two private customers, according to an announcement made by the company Monday.

This will be the first time in 45 years humans will return to deep space, said the company in a news release, and will go "faster and further" than any humans before them.

SpaceX expects the mission to take place some time in late 2018, after it sends a crewed NASA Dragon 2 craft to the International Space Station.

"We have been approached by private individuals," said SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, on a call with reporters on Monday. "This is a private mission with paying customers" who have placed "significant deposits," Musk said, but added that they have so far not authorized the company to reveal their names.

Private space travel could with crewed missions could be "a significant driver of revenue," Musk said. "There is likely a market for at least one or two of these per year," and the missions could contribute "something on the order of 10-20 percent of revenues."

Musk also suggested that he would defer to NASA if the agency expressed interest in taking its own astronauts on the flight.

"NASA always has first priority," Musk said, "so if NASA decides to have the first mission of this nature be a NASA mission, then of course NASA would take priority."

The mission will use one of SpaceX's Dragon 2 capsules, which will be modified to allow communications in deep space. It will be carried by a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket, which is scheduled to make its maiden launch in summer 2017.

Musk said it would be roughly the cost of a crewed mission to the International Space Station, and that other flight crews have already expressed interest in later flights.

The mission would "do a long loop around the moon" and would take about a week. Musk estimated the craft would travel about 300,000 to 400,000 miles.

"It would skim the surface of the moon, go quite a bit further out into deep space" and then return to Earth, Musk said.

"There is some risk here," he said, and added that the hopeful passengers are not "naive" about the dangers. SpaceX will begin holding health and fitness tests later this year. "We will do everything we can to minimize this risk, but it is not zero. They are coming into this with their eyes open."



The Dragon 2 is the craft SpaceX has designed to carry humans, whereas the Dragon craft it currently uses is meant only for cargo.

SpaceX plans to send one uncrewed Dragon 2 capsule to the ISS in the fourth quarter of 2017, followed by the crewed Dragon 2 flight to the ISS in Spring of 2018. The moon mission is expected to take place a few months after that.

"There will be quite a lot of experience with Falcon 9 and Dragon 2," before the crewed moon mission, Musk said, adding that the Falcon Heavy is essentially a Falcon 9 with two extra boosters, and that the Falcon Heavy rockets are also scheduled for several launches over the next several months.

To complete the mission, the company will have to invest in deep space communication technology, which will also be important for the company's planned trips to Mars.

The Dragon 2 will be capable of operating autonomously throughout the whole flight, but the passengers will be trained in emergency procedures.</s>WASHINGTON (CNNMoney) — Two thrill seekers are paying SpaceX to make a trip around the moon next year.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk announced Monday afternoon that the space tourists had already placed a significant deposit for the trip. The travelers will undergo fitness tests and begin training later this year.

“Like the Apollo astronauts before them, these individuals will travel into space carrying the hopes and dreams of all humankind, driven by the universal human spirit of exploration,” SpaceX said in a blog post.

For takeoff, SpaceX will use the same launch pad near Cape Canaveral, Florida, that was used for the Apollo programs missions. No humans have traveled past low Earth orbit since the final Apollo mission in 1972. (Low-earth orbit is essentially the first rung on the ladder in being to space. It’s also where some satellites that circle the Earth reside.)

The company doesn’t expect this to be a one-time mission. SpaceX said that other people have expressed strong interest in making the trip. The names of the first two travelers have not been released. They are likely paying millions for the adventure.

For comparison, space tourists have previously paid the Russia government upwards of $20 million for a trip to the International Space Station. NASA has paid the Russians $80 million a seat to send astronauts to the space station. SpaceX has not revealed the price of the roughly week-long trip.

SpaceX is putting forward an aggressive timeline for the mission, which will rely on a rocket and spacecraft that have not flown yet. The Falcon Heavy rocket is expected to make a test flight this summer. And the Crew Dragon spacecraft, which will hold the two tourists, will complete a demo mission later this year.

“Next year is going to be a big year for carrying people to the space station and hopefully beyond,” Musk said in a conference call with reporters.

“NASA commends its industry partners for reaching higher. We will work closely with SpaceX to ensure it safely meets the contractual obligations to return the launch of astronauts to U.S. soil and continue to successfully deliver supplies to the International Space Station. For more than a decade, NASA has invested in private industry to develop capabilities for the American people and seed commercial innovation to advance humanity’s future in space. NASA is changing the way it does business through its commercial partnerships to help build a strong American space economy and free the agency to focus on developing the next-generation rocket, spacecraft and systems to go beyond the moon and sustain deep space exploration,” responded NASA Officials in a statement.</s>Two thrill seekers are paying SpaceX to make a trip around the moon next year.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk announced Monday afternoon that the space tourists had already placed a significant deposit for the trip. The travelers will undergo fitness tests and begin training later this year.

“Like the Apollo astronauts before them, these individuals will travel into space carrying the hopes and dreams of all humankind, driven by the universal human spirit of exploration,” SpaceX said in a blog post.

For takeoff, SpaceX will use the same launch pad near Cape Canaveral, Florida, that was used for the Apollo programs missions.

The company doesn’t expect this to be a one-time mission. SpaceX said that other people have expressed strong interest in making the trip. The names of the first two travelers have not been released. They are likely paying millions for the adventure.

For comparison, space tourists have previously paid the Russia government upwards of $20 million for a trip to the International Space Station. SpaceX has not publicly revealed the price of its trip.

“Next year is going to be a big year for carrying people to the space station and hopefully beyond,” Musk said in a conference call with reporters.</s>MIAMI: SpaceX said Monday two private citizens have paid money to be sent around the Moon late next year, in what would be the first manned US mission since the 1960s and ’70s.

“We are excited to announce that SpaceX has been approached to fly two private citizens on a trip around the moon late next year,” said a statement by CEO Elon Musk.

“They have already paid a significant deposit to do a moon mission. Like the Apollo astronauts before them, these individuals will travel into space carrying the hopes and dreams of all humankind, driven by the universal human spirit of exploration.”</s>SpaceX will be sending two tourists into space in 2018.

The company, which has been making supply deliveries to the International Space Station, made the announcement Monday.

The plan is to launch a “crewed mission” with two passengers around the moon, but won’t land on it.

“Next year is going to be a big year for carrying people to the space station and hopefully beyond,” Elon Musk told reporters, CNN reports.

The two people who will see the stars approached the company, and they’ve already paid a “significant” deposit.

The trip will be a week long, but Musk wouldn’t identify the pair or the price tag.

Musk says SpaceX is on track to launch astronauts to the International Space Station for NASA in mid-2018. This moon mission would follow about six months later, using a Dragon crew capsule and a Falcon heavy rocket.

Musk says the moon mission is designed to be autonomous – unless something goes wrong.

READ MORE: SpaceX supply ship forced to abort approach to space station

*with files from the Associated Press</s>Elon Musk, the founder and CEO of the rocket company SpaceX, says that two private individuals have hired his firm to fly a manned mission around the moon in late 2018.

Musk said that the two individuals had not given his company permission to release their names, but that they knew each other and have placed a “significant deposit” with the company.

The individuals won’t pilot the spacecraft themselves; it will be controlled by autonomous systems and from the ground. Musk did say if something went wrong, they might have to intervene using the machine’s controls. They will begin a special program of health and safety training.

The mission would take approximately a week, as the rocket loops around the moon into deep space and returns to earth, a distance of approximately three to four hundred thousand miles.

The mission will be flown on the Dragon 2 spacecraft that SpaceX is developing to carry NASA astronauts to the International Space Station. SpaceX made a point of thanking the space agency in its official blog post on the news. SpaceX’s moon mission—unlike the ISS flight—will be launched on the as-yet-unflown Falcon Heavy rocket that the company intends to launch for the first time this summer.

“The Dragon 2 and the Falcon Heavy are the enablers,” Musk said in a conference call with reporters. “This should be a really exciting mission, that will get the world really excited about deep space.”

The Dragon 2 is currently scheduled to fly its first unmanned mission late in 2017, and to fly astronauts for the first time in the second quarter of 2018, though government auditors fear that any unexpected delay could throw off that schedule.

Musk’s tweet announcing the announcement prompted breathless speculation of what news the ambitious space company would deliver. The news is the second major moon mission in the news this month, after NASA said it is considering accelerating plans to fly humans around the moon forward into 2019, a decision prompted by the Trump administration. Commercial space operators have been anticipating a return to moon missions since the transition.

SpaceX’s decision to announce a mission with a similar profile to NASA’s moon orbit, but at much lower cost, may only be a coincidence, but Musk made clear he was ready and willing to take it on for the US government. He said the mission will cost about as much as one of the company’s trips to the International Space Station—about $130 million a pop.

“If NASA decides to have the first mission of this nature be a NASA mission, of course NASA would have priority,” Musk said. “[The space agency] would have priority in any lunar orbit mission.”

Musk stressed that this mission would, like the rest of the company’s work, play into its long-term goal of inter-planetary exploration.

“We’ll have to invest in deep space communication technology and that’s going to be important for future missions to Mars,” he said.</s>Seems like lunar tourism won't be bound to the confines of science fiction for much longer. In a teleconference with reporters, SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk announced that his company will send two paying customers on a trip around the moon and back to Earth by the end of 2018.

According to Musk, the two unidentified space tourists, who know each other and paid a "significant deposit," approached SpaceX to schedule the adventure of a lifetime. If all goes well, they will be the first humans to travel that deep into space in more than 40 years, reports The New York Times. "They are entering this with their eyes open, knowing there is some risk," Musk said.

The journey, which would take about a week, would begin at Florida's Kennedy Space Center. SpaceX will use the same pad that launched the Apollo missions to send the travelers into space on its Dragon 2 vehicle, attached to a Falcon Heavy rocket. No moon walks on this trip, though. The "long loop around the moon" will take the craft on a 300,000- to 400,000-mile tour close to the moon's surface without actually landing and will then head back to Earth using the force of gravity. Dragon 2 is fully automated, so no professional astronauts will need to be aboard, though both passengers will reportedly undergo extensive training prior to liftoff. Other versions of Dragon have successfully transported unmanned supply missions to the International Space Station, though neither the Dragon 2 nor the Falcon Heavy have flown their maiden voyage at this point.

Musk didn't specify exactly how much this out-of-this-world experience would cost the individuals, though he noted that they would pay "a little bit more than the cost of a crewed mission to the space station would be." According to The New York Times , the Falcon Heavy alone cost about $90 million to construct.

This isn't exactly the first time tourists have ventured well beyond the planet. Russia reportedly sent seven private citizens to the International Space Station for a price tag upwards of tens of millions of dollars, and NASA paid $80 million to get an astronaut in on the trip too, according to CNN .

Following Musk's announcement, NASA said in a statement : "NASA commends its industry partners for reaching higher. We will work closely with SpaceX to ensure it safely meets the contractual obligations to return the launch of astronauts to U.S. soil and continue to successfully deliver supplies to the International Space Station."

The space-obsessed duo might want to brush up with a screening of Hidden Figures before they blast off. Or maybe just Gravity.</s>MIAMI: SpaceX said on Monday (Feb 27) two private citizens have paid money to be sent around the Moon late next year, in what would mark the furthest humans have ever travelled to deep space.

The United States has not sent astronauts to the Moon since NASA's Apollo missions of the 1960s and '70s.

"We are excited to announce that SpaceX has been approached to fly two private citizens on a trip around the moon late next year," said a statement by CEO Elon Musk.

"This presents an opportunity for humans to return to deep space for the first time in 45 years and they will travel faster and further into the solar system than any before them."

The tourists, who were not named, "have already paid a significant deposit," Musk's statement added.

Health tests and training are to begin later this year.

"Other flight teams have also expressed strong interest and we expect more to follow. Additional information will be released about the flight teams, contingent upon their approval and confirmation of the health and fitness test results," Musk said.

The tourists will ride aboard the California-based company's Crew Dragon capsule, which is scheduled for its first unmanned test flight later this year.

It is based on the design currently used to send cargo to the International Space Station, with upgrades to allow for human transport.

The capsule will launch atop SpaceX's Falcon Heavy rocket, which is scheduled for its first test flight this summer.

The rocket "will be the most powerful vehicle to reach orbit after the Saturn V moon rocket," Musk said.

"At five million pounds of liftoff thrust, Falcon Heavy is two-thirds the thrust of Saturn V and more than double the thrust of the next largest launch vehicle currently flying."</s>Two tourists are paying SpaceX for a trip around the moon next year.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk announced Monday afternoon that the travelers had already placed a significant deposit.

“Next year is going to be a big year for carrying people to the space station and hopefully beyond,” Musk said in a conference call with reporters.

SpaceX will use the same launch pad near Cape Canaveral, Florida, that was used for the Apollo programs missions.

This story is developing and will be updated.</s>SpaceX Moves To Launch First-Ever Private Mission To The Moon

SpaceX claims it will launch the first ever private moon mission in 2018, which would send people to the moon for the first time in 45 years. The announcement may signify the start of a new race to the moon, this time between NASA and the private space industry.
SpaceX announces that it will take two space tourists on an orbit of the Moon in 2018.