First-ever space hotel slated to be operational by 2027

"This decade will see the start and completion of construction on humanity’s
first hotel in outer space, according to the group behind it, Orbital Assembly.

The 3-year-old company plans to begin building Voyager Station in low Earth
orbit in 2025, and believes its interstellar resort may be operational as soon
as 2027, the Daily Mail reported.

Renderings of the celestial hotel are cosmic-chic: Individual pods are
attached to a rotating wheel, with tubes connecting the different areas
forming an X, similar to the wheel’s spokes.

Guests won’t be paying only for the novelty of the setting — there will be a
slew of onboard amenities, including themed restaurants, a health spa, a
cinema, gyms, libraries, concert venues, Earth-viewing lounges and bars, in
addition to rooms for 400 people. Necessities including crew quarters, air,
water and power will also take up a portion of the space facility."

See:

https://nypost.com/2021/03/01/first-...ional-by-2027/

In article ,
says...

"This decade will see the start and completion of construction on humanity?s
first hotel in outer space, according to the group behind it, Orbital Assembly.

The 3-year-old company plans to begin building Voyager Station in low Earth
orbit in 2025, and believes its interstellar resort may be operational as soon
as 2027, the Daily Mail reported.

Renderings of the celestial hotel are cosmic-chic: Individual pods are
attached to a rotating wheel, with tubes connecting the different areas
forming an X, similar to the wheel?s spokes.

Guests won?t be paying only for the novelty of the setting ? there will be a
slew of onboard amenities, including themed restaurants, a health spa, a
cinema, gyms, libraries, concert venues, Earth-viewing lounges and bars, in
addition to rooms for 400 people. Necessities including crew quarters, air,
water and power will also take up a portion of the space facility."

See:

https://nypost.com/2021/03/01/first-...ional-by-2027/

By 2025? I call bull****. Actually, I call bull**** on the entirety of
this.

Jeff
--
All opinions posted by me on Usenet News are mine, and mine alone.
These posts do not reflect the opinions of my family, friends,
employer, or any organization that I am a member of.

Jeff Findley pounded on thar keyboard to tell us
In article ,
says...

"This decade will see the start and completion of construction on humanity?s
first hotel in outer space, according to the group behind it, Orbital
Assembly.

The 3-year-old company plans to begin building Voyager Station in low Earth
orbit in 2025, and believes its interstellar resort may be operational as
soon as 2027, the Daily Mail reported.

Renderings of the celestial hotel are cosmic-chic: Individual pods are
attached to a rotating wheel, with tubes connecting the different areas
forming an X, similar to the wheel?s spokes.

Guests won?t be paying only for the novelty of the setting ? there will be a
slew of onboard amenities, including themed restaurants, a health spa, a
cinema, gyms, libraries, concert venues, Earth-viewing lounges and bars, in
addition to rooms for 400 people. Necessities including crew quarters, air,
water and power will also take up a portion of the space facility."

See:

https://nypost.com/2021/03/01/first-...ional-by-2027/

By 2025? I call bull****. Actually, I call bull**** on the entirety of
this.

Well, China's station ... admittedly a lot smaller ... is only supposed
to take a year to build, starting this year.

Maybe Orbital Assembly has cribbed some of Jeff Bezos' plans for ONeill
habitats.

What's lead time on a Bigelow module versus an MPLM or a Cygnus?
[Ignoring the time to recall furloughed employees.]

/dps

--
"I am not given to exaggeration, and when I say a thing I mean it"
_Roughing It_, Mark Twain

In article mn.13577e536828663f.127094@snitoo,
says...

Jeff Findley pounded on thar keyboard to tell us
In article ,
says...
See:

https://nypost.com/2021/03/01/first-...ional-by-2027/

By 2025? I call bull****. Actually, I call bull**** on the entirety of
this.

Well, China's station ... admittedly a lot smaller ... is only supposed
to take a year to build, starting this year.

And is made of a small number of metal modules which are docked for
assembly. This "space hotel" looks to have 24 huge Bigelow style
inflatable modules. As far as I know, Bigelow Aerospace is pretty much
defunct. They let pretty much all their staff go some time ago. You'd
likely be hard pressed to get one module out of them, let alone 24.

Also, spinning the station is going to exert large forces on the docking
assemblies. This will require a bit of engineering to stiffen them up.

Maybe Orbital Assembly has cribbed some of Jeff Bezos' plans for ONeill
habitats.

Maybe. But looking at ISS, the last spacewalk took them a full day to
install some new hardware for new roll out solar arrays. Assembling
something as huge as a "space hotel" by spacewalks would be nearly
impossible with today's EVA suits.

What's lead time on a Bigelow module versus an MPLM or a Cygnus?
[Ignoring the time to recall furloughed employees.]

As I said earlier, Bigelow Aerospace is no longer an active company.

Jeff

--
All opinions posted by me on Usenet News are mine, and mine alone.
These posts do not reflect the opinions of my family, friends,
employer, or any organization that I am a member of.

"Jeff Findley" wrote in message
...

In article mn.13577e536828663f.127094@snitoo,
says...

Jeff Findley pounded on thar keyboard to tell us
In article ,
says...
See:

https://nypost.com/2021/03/01/first-...ional-by-2027/

By 2025? I call bull****. Actually, I call bull**** on the entirety
of
this.

Well, China's station ... admittedly a lot smaller ... is only supposed
to take a year to build, starting this year.

And is made of a small number of metal modules which are docked for
assembly. This "space hotel" looks to have 24 huge Bigelow style
inflatable modules. As far as I know, Bigelow Aerospace is pretty much
defunct. They let pretty much all their staff go some time ago. You'd
likely be hard pressed to get one module out of them, let alone 24.

Also, spinning the station is going to exert large forces on the docking
assemblies. This will require a bit of engineering to stiffen them up.

Maybe Orbital Assembly has cribbed some of Jeff Bezos' plans for ONeill
habitats.

Maybe. But looking at ISS, the last spacewalk took them a full day to
install some new hardware for new roll out solar arrays. Assembling
something as huge as a "space hotel" by spacewalks would be nearly
impossible with today's EVA suits.

What's lead time on a Bigelow module versus an MPLM or a Cygnus?
[Ignoring the time to recall furloughed employees.]

As I said earlier, Bigelow Aerospace is no longer an active company.

Jeff


Honestly, I don't see those as the main problem. I mean, yeah, they're an
issue, but I'm sure if someone wrote Bigelow a big enough check today,
they'd be hiring by tomorrow.

The problem is any investors are going to want to see a clear timeline on
their investment and I'm not seeing that here.

Let's say you can get the Bigelow modules for $10M/each and launch 1 per
Falcon 9. That's about $70M a pop.
So you're talking $1.6B to build the thing.

Now you need paying customers. Even if you fly 4 at a pope on a Falcon 9,
they're paying $15M a pop.
Charge them $5M each for their stay, you need to fly nearly 336 passengers
before you make a profit.

Just not seeing it. And that ignore all your other costs.

Now, if it were "we're launching a single Bigelow and expect to fly to it 10
times" I might believe it.

But I jut can't see the ROI here.

--
Greg D. Moore http://greenmountainsoftware.wordpress.com/
CEO QuiCR: Quick, Crowdsourced Responses. http://www.quicr.net
IT Disaster Response -
https://www.amazon.com/Disaster-Resp...dp/1484221834/

On 3/2/2021 12:19 PM, wrote:
"This decade will see the start and completion of construction on humanity’s
first hotel in outer space, according to the group behind it, Orbital Assembly.


This is somewhat old news. I know I saw this writeup last year, not sure
I remember where, Popular Mechanics? Don't know.

But yes, I agree with Jeff, this is too grandiose to be deliverable in
the time-frame they project. It also features lifting body escape
vehicles along the ring circumference should there be some unnamed
mishap. So now you have *two* development projects to complete before it
becomes real.

Bigelow is out of business (also as Jeff says), due to the COVID
shutdown in 2020.

https://spacenews.com/bigelow-aerosp...ire-workforce/

The company leaves out the hope that it might restart after the pandemic
lockdown in Nevada ends. Without a government contract in hand, that
seems unlikely to me.

Besides China, there *is* a new space startup in Kentucky called Space
Tango, that might actually be on track to deliver an orbital laboratory
(they call it a mini-space station, in actuality it looks a lot like a
cargo Dragon capsule). The intent is to provide an automated orbital
processing facility for manufacturing objects (like fiber optic cable)
that benefit from forming in zero-g and then returning them intact to
Earth. Currently the only means to do that is with cargo and crew
Dragons or Soyuzs returning from the ISS.

https://www.upi.com/Science_News/202...7881614353802/

But perhaps, with a little innovation, one might be able to spin these
off into 'space campers', a fully automated capsule for the well-heeled
who might want to take a family trip into orbit, experience zero-g for a
week or so and then return. Ride sharing on a Falcon 9 or perhaps a
Rocket Labs Neutron.

I'd say this route will be far more likely than Orbital Assembly's plan
within the next 25 possibly 50 years. What is strange is that I can see
potential lunar bases and Mars base before this becomes reality.

Dave