Opinion: What will the future of space travel look like? And what does it mean for this planet? – The San Diego Union-Tribune

We asked: SpaceX is planning its first orbital test flight of a starship that could one day take people to the moon or even Mars. What do you think about the future of space travel?

As a child, I remember spending late nights looking out of the window beside my bed, my warm breath fogging up the cold, reflective glass. I remember gazing wondrously at the sparkling stars above in the clear night sky, imagining that I was in a starship of my own. I remember imagining the loud hum of my house heater as the roar of my starships engines as I was taken into the immense expanses of the universe. I remember dreaming about stepping foot onto the ground of foreign planets and exploring their alien environments, finding myself gazing into their vast horizons. Little did my young self know that may very well be possible in the near future.

With the development of next-generation spacecraft and technology, my dream of setting foot onto an unfamiliar planet these days may not be so impossible. Of course, I dont think wed be setting foot on planets dozens of parsecs away anytime soon, but the future of space travel looks bright with SpaceX and NASAs recent advancements in spacecraft.

More specifically, SpaceXs recent developing spacecraft known as Starship has been in development for almost two decades and will reach orbit around Earth this year. This same spaceship is even capable of taking people to Mars on a planned mission in the future, as it can also refuel in orbit. These new developments in space technology, in my opinion, make space travel much more practical.

From what I think, at least, space travel may even one day enter the commercial field. Imagine this: You set foot into the cozy cabin of a starship after scanning your ticket, pulling your luggage inside and sighing as the air-conditioned cabin cools you down. After making your way farther into the cabin of the spaceship, you finally locate your seat beside a window. You place your luggage into the overhead bin and plop yourself onto the soft cushions of the seat, sighing as you look out the window and gaze into the vast expanse of the solar system and beyond. As you tune out the voices of nearby passengers and blend them into the peaceful lull of the spacecrafts engine, you observe the bright Moon in the distance. Maybe space travel for common people like you and me wont be so impractical soon!

Arthur Nguyen, Mira Mesa

In the 1960s, I was an Apollo engineer at Cape Kennedy. We were going to land on the moon because President John F. Kennedy vaguely said it was a good idea. The money flowed freely. Some 50 years later, my grandson asked me why we went there. I was one of the people who worked to achieve that goal, and I could not find a good answer as to why.

I attended meetings at the cape in which the word was out no questions permitted as to why, only discussions allowed as to how. It became clear the corporations, the universities, the engineers everyone wanted to share in the dollars. We brought back lots of moon rock samples to analyze. Still available to look at in Houston. More rocks would not be very useful.

The Challenger explosion in 1986 should remind us of how dangerous it is to try again to go back. The old phrase Been there, done that is more than a clich. It is also a warning.

Fred Zarse, Alpine

Whenever humankind discovers a new technology, its common for people to be afraid. Before modern science, when a woman liked to study botany or holistic practices, society might accuse her of witchcraft and put her on trial to be burned at the stake. Edgar Allan Poe wrote about his fear of modern technology and the future. At one point, reading books was criticized and considered strange.

Later, when the internet was invented, there was a lot of resistance. Older people used to be so out of touch, but now if you walk through an elderly facility, youll see dozens of older people scrolling through the internet. My grandmother would stay up late into the night asking Siri questions about her childhood and past presidents. It was adorable.

People dont like to change. Although it can be scary to try new things, thats why we have so many wonderful inventions around the world. Who would have imagined that by studying genetics eventually scientists would be able to grow new hearts, livers and other organs for sick patients? (Although its still a new science). Who would have imagined the prospect of growing our meat products in a lab instead of farming animals? The idea of space exploration is the same as all the other discoveries weve made.

The unknown is scary, but its also promising. Just as you never know what harm it could bring, you never know what good it could bring either. Therefore, I say, bring on the unknown!

Cassidy Eiler, El Cajon

Matthew McConaughey redeemed himself on Super Bowl Sunday. In contrast with his suave Lincoln promotions, he turned out for Salesforces Team Earth in a Super Bowl ad aimed at workers who would be happy for a benign commute on terra firma honest Earthlings with no ambitions of being Joe the Plumber-turned-astronaut. It was refreshing.

In the last year, if we werent reeling enough from the pretentious Donald Trump years and callous disregard for workers on the front lines of a pandemic, we were treated to the spectacle of billionaires flexing their intrepid astronaut wings, boldly bragging and spinning where none could have dreamed to do so before.

Some were honest not to dress it up as science, rather as a new consumer experience. Sir Richard Branson literally took a pen and pad to take notes on how to improve the guest experience. I suppose that merits a tax write off? Jeff Bezos won the feel-good moment by sponsoring our beloved Captain Kirks initiation to actual space. Well played. Elon Musk surprised us by deferring his own travel in favor of sending a geologist along with a paying guest. That might offer a momentary counterbalance to his Scarlet A (arrogance), but it is hard to square his sustainability initiatives with this suspected objective to take his toys and slip the surly bonds of earth.

I cant sort out if he lacks confidence that humanity will solve the climate action imperative (and he would need a Planet B) or if he thinks his efforts will succeed so stunningly that his space exploits and all the carbon emissions and resource diversion they require will be a harmless investment?

Since none of these billionaires has shown how space travel could be affordable to the 99 percent, let alone environmentally benign, it feels a lot like our billionaire astronauts arent content to simply squander Earths resources for their own thrill rides They want adulation as well, as though Joe the Plumber now aspires to be a millionaire Martian, and dreaming will make it so.

Mothers like me watched NASAs missions as kids Apollo missions, in my case. We have it in us to dream of new frontiers, and we want our children to carry forward and explore. SpaceX has helped this continue. But there is a clear and urgent threat we are facing now that makes our planetary explorations take a back seat to species health and sustenance. Further, even if we imagine earning a golden ticket, what kind of humans would emigrate from a populous planet in crisis without focusing their best efforts at saving it for all?

Resources are finite. Our atmospheric carbon budget is non-negotiable. Carbon capture and sequestration, if it ever works out, will be a bandage, not a cure. We must not allow the 1 percent to delude the 99 percent on this. There is no Planet B for any of us, and certainly not the working class. Im fighting for Team Earth!

Darlene Garvais, Sabre Springs

The future of space flight will be the same as it is today: scientific robotic exploration and limited commercial missions, such as communication satellites. Meanwhile, the future of space travel for humans will still be a fantasy. These are just a few reasons why.

With current technology, the energy required to launch an Atlas D rocket into space with one person aboard could fuel some 3,000 cars. Basically, a person is sitting on top of high explosives, traveling hundreds of miles per hour into the massive debris field that shrouds the planet to be exposed to high levels of radiation. Despite the buy-in from various billionaire space moguls, getting people into space is expensive. While its still murky what a commercial flight will cost, a ride in a Soyuz capsule was $20 million or more per seat. So space travel remains an impractical, dangerous and expensive proposition.

There is one other reason why human space flight is a fantasy. In 1969, I watched reruns of Star Trek with its rich tapestry of star bases and Class M worlds to explore. I had a scrapbook of news clippings of the NASA moon landing. Using the logic of a 7-year-old, the next step was for us to establish space stations and bases on the moon, Mars and other planets. Which presents the real problem with human space travel: There is nowhere for us to go.

Mike Stewart, Spring Valley

Space. The final frontier, or so they say. Many of us may have dreamt of being astronauts when we grew up one day, and some of us probably did. I frankly did not. But, I am always interested in hearing more about what the future of Space exploration holds, what was discovered, and simply looking at pictures of distant galaxies. When SpaceX came out saying they are developing a craft that could possibly take people to the moon or Mars, it was pretty exciting knowing what we may discover in the future.

I always used to say that I would go to the moon when I grew up, and I was going to find other life on planets we had yet to set foot on. First of all, training to go to space is significantly gruesome having to prepare your body for the mission. Secondly it is extremely expensive to get all the equipment needed, and faculty to ensure everything runs smoothly. That is not to mention all the debris that is left behind in Earths orbit which is no longer of use to anyone. This was one of the main problems of space exploration before. The amount of money used to just no longer be of use to anyone and remain in Earths orbit.

This is where the engineers at SpaceX revolutionized space travel. They finally achieved the ability to reuse what was once considered space junk, by returning stage one of the spacecraft back to the place of launch. This has opened new possibilities in terms of space as a whole. I am no scientist, but being able to consistently reuse the thruster of a spacecraft seems as if you would be able to send more spacecraft into or out of orbit within a much smaller time frame, and possibly even cost less in the long run.

If these rockets were to be mass produced and widely used, traveling to space would not take as long, and the price for someone to go into space should be lower as time goes on. We would not only be able to run more test experiments in space, but scientists would also be able to gather more information much more efficiently as well. I imagine a high end production line of scientist and groups waiting their turn to board the reusable rocket, or mounting their telescopes on other stages to explore the great unknown. It will all eventually trickle down to spacecraft becoming similar to airfare, where people will be boarding to fly to a colony on mars or the moon for a small getaway.

This is a long process ahead of scientist and engineers, yet it is one that could change our way of life, and possibly lead to the evolution of mankind. Who knows, by that time we could be boarding our own Millennium Falcon or X-Wings that can take us into hyperdrive to other galaxies, and our current methods of transportation would become obsolete.

Daniel Martinez, San Ysidro

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Opinion: What will the future of space travel look like? And what does it mean for this planet? - The San Diego Union-Tribune