DARK TOURISM

Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic Strikes Deal With NASA to Help Take Tourists to Space

Virgin Galactic will train up the wannabe astronauts, then find the right transportation to the International Space Station.

Billionaire Richard Branson’s space tourism venture, Virgin Galactic, will start organizing private trips to the International Space Station as part of a new deal with NASA, the company announced Monday. In a statement, Virgin Galactic said it had reached an agreement with NASA to develop “a new private orbital astronaut readiness program” which will see it find companies or organizations who want to send private citizens to the ISS, train up the wannabe astronauts on how to prepare for orbit and how to use the ISS, and then find the right transportation to shoot them to the satellite station. The company said the journeys will range from “private citizen expeditions to government-enabled scientific research missions.” George Whitesides, CEO of Virgin Galactic said: “We want to bring the planetary perspective to many thousands of people.”