China’s Foray Into Space Tourism Looks Like Blue Origin’s New Shepard
Image via CAS Space
As the billionaire space race heats up stateside, China is thinking of venturing into the market, too.
A space venture by the commercial arm of the Chinese Academy of Science (CAS) has just revealed a first peek at the rockets it’s developing for space tourism.
Similar to the trip Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson took with their respective companies, CAS Space’s trip will also see a single-stage reusable rocket head up to the Kármán line, or what is considered to be the beginning of space.
Image via CAS Space
At first glance, the Chinese rockets do seem to resemble Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket quite a bit, at least from the exterior. Space.com noted that there are key differences as well, with the CAS version making use of five “xuanyuan” kerosene-liquid oxygen engines, as compared to New Shepard’s BE-3 liquid hydrogen-liquid oxygen model.
Since the rocket is reusable, it’ll follow a similar catch model to Elon Musk’s SpaceX concept, in which the rocket returns to Earth and is “caught” by an arm protruding from the launch tower.
While these images are just renders of the actual rocket, they have still caught the attention of many in the industry that China’s first space tourism venture would be so similar to those from the US. Will CAS be able to sell tickets for their tours anytime soon? We’ll have to wait and see.
Image via CAS Space
[via Space.com, images via CAS Space]
Also check out these recent news
