Source: freepik.es
In this context, this Sunday July 11 Richard Branson made the first trip with his own aircraft called unity owned by his company Virgin Galactic this billionaire reached an altitude of just over 80 kilometers between the boundary of the atmosphere and outer space, however, a competitor company of Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, said that Branson's trip can not be called a space trip for not reaching the altitude of 100 kilometers and reach the line called Kármán which is considered the gateway to space, which if it can be done with his ship of the company he founded and directs called Blue Origin. Another competitor in this race for space tourism is Elon Musk founder of the space transportation company Space X who says that his company will be ready to offer its trips to space tourists by 2023 with its first destination being the moon.
Now all this news makes us think about what is really important or what is the intention of these trips, what are these companies really trying to demonstrate? Because although it seems that it is the curiosity of the human being that has led him to explore the frontiers of outer space, it could also be thought of an interest that goes beyond curiosity, such as demonstrating the power of money when it comes to exploring and conquering new spaces. Tourism has always been considered a very profitable business, there are even countries whose gross annual income depends exclusively on tourism, however, tourism has a number of implications and associated factors that have made today's tourism companies promote the care and protection of the environment because tourism as a human activity is also the most devastating.
The costs of tourism investment are extremely high, humbly here on planet earth is required to achieve a capital and savings, often a full year to achieve a pleasure trip. In the case of space tourism, it is designed for an elite that can afford an average of 20 million dollars to pay for a round trip ticket to the moon in one of the three companies that offer it at auction at that cost. These costs initially indicate that space tourism will not be accessible to all people, not even to half of the human beings, we are talking about a very small and select group of people.
In this sense, I have many doubts, certainly this means a gigantic advance in technology, there is no doubt about that, but what are the consequences of these trips. I think that many of these people who invest their resources in looking outwards, towards outer space are implanting in the minds of many other people the idea of not valuing our planet, I would like to know if they have thought for a moment, how much help could be that same amount of investment, intellect and technology to help the poor countries of the world to solve many situations involving disease, hunger and misery. I know well that everyone who owns their money can use it as they wish and invest it as they see fit, but to be honest it seems illogical to me such exaggerated investments to visit the moon when you are not able to learn the geography of the country where you live or to appreciate nature and much more important to respect life on this your planet.
Congratulations for space travel, as I say space tourism as any other economic activity I am sure will be very profitable, I only regret that this leads people to move further and further away from the reality of a planet that is dying and dying while those who have the power and resources prefer to go looking for another place to settle and why not to destroy it.
