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A $90 ticket into space?

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A new San Diego startup is charging people $90 to enter a contest whose winners will be offered a free trip into space even though such commercial flights aren’t available to the general public.

Spaceship Earth Grants (SEG) began accepting applications on Monday with the hope that Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic or another company will develop a safe, reliable spaceship to carry passengers on sub-orbital flights.

A variety of problems have repeatedly forced Virgin Galactic to delay the start of commercial space tourism missions. Branson said last week that it appears that service will begin in 2015. There are more than 500 customers on the company’s “future astronaut” waiting list, some of whom paid as much as $250,000 for a ticket.

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A handful of private citizens have traveled to the International Space Station. But after decades of exploring the idea, companies have yet to find a way to create airlines for the space tourism market.

“I went into space twice and it fundamentally changed my life. I want others to have the same experience,” said Leland Melvin, the former NASA space shuttle astronaut who now serves as president of SEG.

“I’ve read some of the responses on the applications. I felt like crying; people have wanted to do this for so long.”

SEG says it will award one spaceflight for every 50,000 applications, increasing the frequency if the pool gets large. The company is still working out key details of the contest, including precisely how winners will be chosen and how they will be trained for flights that must reach an altitude of about 62 miles to reach the edge of space.

To enter the contest, people must go to SEG’s website and write a summary of why they want to travel into space. They also have to produce a 90-second video that answers the question, “How will you use this experience to better yourself, your community or our planet?”

SEG is charging an application fee that ranges from $15 to $90, based on the relative wealth of an applicant’s home country. US residents pay $90. The company will accept applications through Dec. 31st. Applicants are encouraged to improve their standing by posting messages on social media from early January through the end of February. SEG will announce winners on April 12, 2015. The winners will be chosen by a large panel of judges that includes Bill Nye the Science Guy, who also is CEO of the Planetary Society, former astronaut Ron Garan, and Mindy Fletcher, a San Diego public relations executive and the wife of Nathan Fletcher, a former California assemblyman. He is on SEG’s board.

Melvin said applicants will be closely evaluated on their ability to publicly communicate the experience of briefly traveling in space. Decisions also could be influenced by where a person lives to reflect the geographic diversity of the applicant pool. But some details of the judging remain to be worked out.

“We hope to get at least 200,000 applications,” said Melvin, citing a figure partly based on the number of people who expressed varying levels of interest in making a proposed one-way trip to Mars. The trip is being proposed by Mars One, a non-profit organization in the Netherlands. Just over 2,700 people paid fees to have their application processed.

SEG says the contest will be “presented by Star Harbor Space Training Academy,” whose operational details have yet to be disclosed. Further information will be released in October by the company, which is a public-benefit corporation, a type of non-profit. The academy will be seperately funded from the contest.

Melvin wasn’t troubled that SEG has started a contest before private industry has demonstrated that it can safely transport commercial passengers to and from space.

“You have naysayers about all kinds of technologies,” Melvin said during a cellphone conversation with U-T San Diego. “But look at dreamers like Steve Jobs. This thing (his phone) allows you to talk to people and plays music. Who thought that would happen?”

The contest drew support from Jennifer Vaughn, chief operating officer of the Planetary Society, a Pasadena-based advocacy group.

“The Planetary Society supports endeavors that allow citizens a closer relationship with space exploration,” Vaughn said by email. “While we’re not directly involved in the tourism aspect of space, we recognize there’s strong public interest in the concept.”

The new program also appeals to John Spencer, president of the Space Tourism Society, a Los Angeles=based advocacy group.

“It may take a year or two before companies are flying commerical passengers. But we prefer that they take their time and do the flight testing right,” Spencer said. “This is going to happen. Humanity is moving outward.

Some of the passengers will come from San Diego. Craig Buck, president of Travel Masters in San Diego, has booked two flights on behalf of Virgin Galactic.

“I think that once a few flights happen and the general public sees how this works, there’s going to be a lot of interest.”

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