Japan space tourist says moon training ‘shouldn’t be too hard’

TOKYO, Oct 9, (AFP): Billionaire Japanese tycoon and future space tourist Yusaku Maezawa’s training to go the moon should not be too tricky, he joked Tuesday, adding that he planned to use free time from his six-hour work day to squeeze it in.

The 42-year-old Maezawa paid an undisclosed sum for a ticket on fellow tycoon Elon Musk’s SpaceX rocket around the moon as early as 2023 and the passionate art collector also plans to take around half a dozen artists with him on the trip.

“It hasn’t been decided yet what training I will need to undergo but Elon Musk has said it shouldn’t be too hard,” Maezawa jested, adding in Japanese, “I believe English will be a must.”

Asked how he could fit astronaut training around his already hectic schedule, he said he adhered to his own company policy of working a six-hour day and devoting the rest of the time to personal projects.

“I don’t go to work from morning to night. I’m there three or four times a week and I try to go home after six hours,” Maezawa told a packed news conference in Tokyo.

Maezawa will hitch a ride aboard Musk’s Big Falcon Rocket (BFR), which SpaceX has acknowledged may not be ready for human flight for at least five years.

First announced in 2016 and estimated to cost $5 billion, the BFR was touted as the most powerful rocket in history, even more potent than the Saturn V moon rocket that launched the Apollo missions five decades ago.

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SINGAPORE: British entrepreneur Richard Branson said he expects his Virgin Galactic company to conduct its first space flight “within weeks, not months” in comments broadcast Tuesday.

Speaking to CNBC in Singapore, the billionaire Virgin founder said the company was “more than tantalizingly close” to launching its first mission to space, and that he himself hoped to briefly leave Earth within “months not years.”

“We will be in space with people not too long after that,” he added.

Branson’s Virgin Galactic is racing against Amazon creator Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin to launch the first out-of-this-world passenger flight and take paying passengers into space.

Both companies will offer customers a weightless experience that will last just minutes, passing through the imaginary line marking where space begins – either the Karman line, at 100 kilometres (62 miles), or the 50-mile boundary recognized by the US Air Force.