Agence France-PresseMar 03, 2021 13:11:08 IST
This is the kind of opportunity that comes just once in a Blue Moon: a Japanese billionaire throws a private moon trip to eight people from all over the world. Yusaku Maezawa, an online fashion tycoon, was named in 2018 as the first to book a place aboard the lunar spacecraft that SpaceX is developing. Maezawa, who paid an undisclosed sum for the tour which was scheduled to launch in 2023 at the earliest, initially said he planned to invite six to eight artists to come together on the voyage around the Moon. But Wednesday, in a video posted on a Twitter account, it revealed a broader application process.
“I invite you to join me on this mission. Eight of you from all over the world,” he said. “I bought all the seats, so it will be a private tour,” he said.
Maezawa, 45, said his first plan to invite artists had “come forward” because he came to believe that “an artist could have everyone is doing something creative. “
The Japanese entrepreneur said applicants had to meet just two criteria: be prepared to “push the envelope” creatively, and be willing to help other team members do the same.
In total, he said there will be about 10 to 12 people aboard the spacecraft, which is expected to orbit the Moon before returning to Earth.
The application timeline for spots on the trip requires space travelers to pre-register by 14 March, with initial screening done by 21 March.
No dates are set for the next stages – “assignment” and online interview – but final interviews and medical examinations are currently scheduled for the end of May 2021, according to a website Maezawa.
Musk ‘very confident’
Maezawa and his astronaut band will be the first lunar passengers since the last U.S. Apollo mission in 1972 – if SpaceX can pull off the orbit.
Last month, a prototype of his Starship crashed into a fireball while trying to land just after a test flight, the second such crash, after the last prototype of the Starship met to a similar situation in December.
But the company hopes the 394-foot (120-meter) rocket system will bring one-day crew and cargo reuse to the Moon, Mars and beyond.
“I am very confident that we will have reached orbit several times with Starship by 2023 and that it will be safe enough for human transport by 2023. It looks very promising,” SpaceX founder Elon Musk said in Maezawa video posted Wednesday.
The mission is the first private space mission outside Earth’s orbit, Musk said.
With it not landing on the Moon, but a curve behind it, “we expect humans to go farther than anyone has ever gone from planet Earth,” he said.
Maezawa, known for his intriguing ideas and unconventional lifestyle including penchant for expensive art, was valued last year at around $ 1.9 billion, making him one of the richest people in Japan.
He made his fortune as the founder of online fashion store Zozo, which he sold to Yahoo! Japan in 2019.
Maezawa has previously made headlines with an online ad for a girlfriend to join him on his SpaceX flight – just to abruptly cancel the hunt, despite attracting nearly 30,000 applicants.
The US space agency NASA plans to land astronauts on the Moon, including the first female, in 2024.
One of the goals of his Artemis III voyage was to recover 85 kilograms (187 pounds) of lunar specimens – more than the average 64 kilograms that Apollo missions brought back between 1969 and 1972.