A Bangkok agent has been selected to recruit the first Thai space tourist by the end of the year for a ticket price of 135,000, news reports said Friday.
Amsterdam-based Space Expedition Corporation (SXC) said it had selected Thai travel agent Khiri Voyages to book its first Thai private astronaut, who would undergo training in the Netherlands and blast off by the end of this year or early in 2014.
SXC is competing with Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic to provide the first regular commercial flights for space tourists.
Khiri Voyages said it had launched a Thai-language website to recruit Thais who are fit and adventurous enough — as well as rich enough — to make the trip into space.
Only one passenger will fly with the pilot of the Lynx Mark I or Mark II space jet, which will take off from either the Mojave Desert in California or from Curacao in the southern Caribbean Sea.
The entire trip will take approximately one hour, including about six minutes of weightlessness.