Which space tourists have ‘the right stuff’?

By Leonard David

Senior space writer

updated 7:05 p.m. ET March 25, 2005

Is your "right stuff" quotient up to snuff?

Last December, the U.S. Congress passed the Commercial Space Launch Amendments Act of 2004. That legislation gave the Federal Aviation Administration, among other duties, the go-ahead to start shaping rules on medical requirements for a spaceship passenger — termed a "spaceflight participant" — an individual (who is not crew) carried within a launch vehicle or re-entry vehicle.

The FAA’s Associate Administrator for Commercial Space Transportation has already issued draft guidelines for those ready-and-wanting space tourists among us.

Under a new regulatory regime, you as a paying passenger will be able to zoom into space sitting inside a commercial space vehicle, once you’ve been informed of and assume the significant risks of the venture. Additional rules yet to come, FAA officials explain, will help promote the emerging commercial human spaceflight industry, putting it on a solid regulatory footing.

Make astronauts of us all
There’s good reason for the federal hubbub. Ticketed public space travel is getting more real by the day.

SpaceShipOne's flights to the edge of space demonstrated that fact last year. Space designer Burt Rutan, along with his Scaled Composites team in Mojave, Calif., snagged the $10 million Ansari X Prize with financial backing from billionaire Paul Allen. They won the purse as the first private outfit to launch a vehicle that carried the equivalent weight of three persons on board from the Mojave Spaceport to suborbital space and return safely twice within a two-week span.

That was quickly followed by Sir Richard Branson, owner of the Virgin Group, taking the wraps off Virgin Galactic. He plans to fly patrons into suborbital space within the next two or three years aboard a fleet of five passenger spaceships now under design by Scaled Composites. In licensing SpaceShipOne’s technology, Branson wants to build the world’s first private spaceship to go into commercial operating service.

"Standing at the edge of the Mojave Desert back in October, I’ve got to tell you, the stomping grounds of Buck Rogers didn’t seem all that far away anymore," FAA Administrator Marion Blakey admitted last month during a Commercial Space Transportation Forecast Conference in Washington.

"You know, the steps we take today are pouring a foundation for an industry that very well could make astronauts of us all," Blakey said.

Cruise to the edge of space
Astronauts conjure images of the paragon of good health, exercised to the max, posture perfect, with eyesight that gives Superman a run for his money.

The picture will likely be quite different for paying space travelers. One thing the FAA must wrestle with is what sorts of medical requirements might be necessary.

"You must have a common-sense approach," said Melchor Antunano, director of the FAA’s Civil Aerospace Medical Institute in Oklahoma City.

For suborbital flights, Antunano said, one proposal would have a passenger fill out a medical questionnaire, leaving it up to the spaceship operator to determine if that person is in a go or no-go condition. Also, paying customer may need to sign consent forms acknowledging that they accept the risk of a cruise to the edge of space.

For an orbital trek, it makes sense to go another step, perhaps having a space tourist undergo some form of preflight testing, Antunano said.

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