space tourism

When I was a teenager, my favourite yearbook was Space 1999, a British series starring Barbara Bain & Martin Landau (one of the most successful husband and wife teams) and also Catherine Schell as Maya, who could morph into a frog, an insect, or even a rock! It seems those early days of sci-fi series like this, and Star Trek may have also been the crux of inspiration for two men – Jeff Bezos (Blue Origin, USA) and Richard Branson (Virgin Galactic, UK) who have now morphed from A-to-Z-e-commerce entrepreneur (Bezos) and Virgin-everything-until-you’re-not entrepreneur (Branson) into commercial astronauts! Fun facts Martin Landau was Cmdr. John Koenig of Moonbase Alpha, a ship stranded in space with a quest to find its way home while Barbara Bain was Dr. Helena Russell, the cool and professional chief medical officer on the lunar station. Another Space 1999 character was Ziena Merton who played the role of Italian data analyst, Sandra Benes. Merton was born in Brunei, her mother was Burmese, father half English, half French and raised in Singapore, Portugal, Borneo and England. Maya is a character I still have in mind – fans may recall her monobrow! via GIPHY Space tourism Yesterday, on 20 July 2021, Amazon founder’s Blue Origin completed New Shepard ship’s first human flight (after 15 test flights prior to this one) with four civilians onboard; Jeff Bezos, his brother Mark Bezos, 82-year old Wally Funk who’s now the oldest person to fly in space and the 18-year old Dutchman Oliver Daemen whose father bid for the ticket, making him the first person in history as a commercial astronaut and the youngest person to fly in space as they passed the Kármán Line, the internationally recognised boundary of space located 100km from the Earth’s mean sea line. Astronauts were in communicado with ground crew at mission control and the in-cabin voice of Sara Knight was eeriely familiar since my last AirAsia commercial flight in 2019. But her voice also reminded me of Maya! Virgin Galactic’s Sir Richard Branson and his crew of five others (plus two pilots aboard mothership VMS Eve pictured above) on 11th July blasted off just 20KM short of the Karman Line, technically not reaching ‘space’ and yet having the few minutes of ZERO G aboard VSS Unity also made history, with two women aboard, one of whom with Indian heritage. 22 flights were done prior to this one. Read more: https://bit.ly/AFT-VSS-Unity Environmental impact What do the environmental groups say about this? Dr. Stuart Parkinson, ED of Scientists for Global Responsibility whose patrons include the likes of the late Prof. Stephen Hawking, cited a report by the Climate Change Committee where the UK government’s advisory body found that 62% of the necessary measures by society to reduce carbon emissions involve societal and behavour change. Avoiding air travel was one, whereby the carbon footprint of a return flight from London to Hong Kong is 3.5 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (tCO2e), similar to a UK citizen’s average car use for over 10 months. In that same article, one space flight results in emissons of at least 330 tCO2e, according to Prof. Mike Berners-Lee of Lancaster University and a renowned spokesperson on carbon footprinting. Parkinson snubs the aim of the journeys, saying “A few minutes of zero-gravity experience and a nice view… environmental vandalism for the super-rich”. Can tax save humanity? As a boutique agency, we can only stand back and watch how billionnaires like Bezos and Branson fulfil their personal dreams. But our question is, was it really just space travel? We all need to pivot and find newsworthy experiences for purposes of building brand equity and while the new frontier is looking fantastic, it seems like it curtails a greater purpose…which in our opinion, in real terms today, is to survive as long as we can on this planet without destroying what’s left of it. While space tourism sounds exciting, a more sustainable option could be donning a 360° viewfinder and experiencing it via VR lens. Or, perhaps there ought to be a hefty carbon tax put onto the space travellers if reason cannot stop them. Just like in Oaxaca in Mexico, their Mayor introduced a soft drink & candy ban for children under 18 in a bid to manage rising health concerns. A sugar tax has been introduced in several countries like Singapore, Norway, Bahrain, Brunei, Finland, India, Ireland, Malaysia, Philippines and Sri Lanka with 2020 Australian of the Year Dr. James Muecke AM proposing it for Australia. The World Health Organisation (WHO) encourages people to take as little sugar as possible because “nutritionally, people do not need any sugar in their diet”. It said that reducing sugar intake to 25g a day would provide health benefits. This is six teaspoons according to the WHO. If they can’t implement a sugar tax globally, will they be able to succeed in implementing a carbon emission tax? That onus falls back onto the policymakers, conscience of the entrepreneur and commercial astronauts themselves. Or perhaps, we just need a really good Netflix series titled Space 2999 while the big boys go in search of a more sustainable and clean fuel!