Justin Bieber is going into space. And he plans to make a music video while he’s up there in what is fairly certain to be one swaggy step for mankind.
The teen is just the latest uber rich, famous person to sign up for a suborbital flight to the initial frontier of outer space aboard Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo rocket plane.
Virgin’s founder, Sir Richard Branson, tweeted the news that the 19-year-old and his manager, Scott “Scooter” Braun, have signed up to the elite spaceflights program.
“Great to hear @justinbieber & @scooterbraun are latest @virgingalactic future astronauts,” Branson wrote. “Congrats, see you up there!”
The singer first responded by retweeting Branson, replying a few hours later to the Virgin head with a message, saying :
“let’s shoot a music video in SPACE!! #nextLEVEL.”
For anyone surprised to learn of Bieber’s desire to go into space, follow the link to this 2010 soundcheck ( scroll to 11.00 minutes ) to hear a 16-year-old waxing lyrical about a trip to the moon.
Fast forward to February this year, the singer told his (now 40 million plus) Twitter followers: “I wanna do a concert in space.”
To which Nasa, who have previously spoken about their interest in harnessing the social media power that is Bieber to entice young people into science, replied: “Maybe we can help you with that.”
But, it seems in the space race for Bieber, Virgin trumped Nasa.
A ride on the SpaceShipTwo is a cool $250,000, evidence of either rising fuel prices and/or the high demand for a seat on the trip of a lifetime. But according to Virgin Galactic’s website, more than 600 people have laid out for a spot on the flights.
Of course, for Bieber, whose net worth is estimated at $110 million, that price tag is clearly small change compared to the thrill of getting away from gravity’s pull and a growing list of — alleged — incidents.
SpaceShipTwo was put through its first supersonic rocket-powered flight test in California in April and is slated to kick off commercial operations at Spaceport America in New Mexico in early 2014. Until then, the space plane is in its testing phase.
Bieber, Braun, and a roll call of other A-listers who have reportedly signed up — Ashton Kutcher, Tom Hanks, Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, Leonardo DiCaprio and the ageless Victoria Principal — will be flown 62 miles above the earth, the altitude internationally accepted as the boundary of outer space.
So, what can the lucky passengers-in-waiting expect to see and feel?
Imagine just a few minutes of sublime weightlessness and a view of terra firma curving beneath a black sky. And if all that doesn’t get the wonder stuff flowing, the return trip and landing mirrors a sensation not unlike a roller-coaster ride — only way better.
For a nascent commercial suborbital spaceflight industry, the obvious benefits of spreading a little Bieber Fever among the stars is a no-brainer. Back in 2012, Seth Shostak, senior astronomer at the SETI Institute noted (without irony) the publicity value of sending the Canadian into space.
“My suggestion is, be sure to send Justin Bieber on one of these flights early on,” Shostak told the Next Generation Suborbital Researchers Conference. “If there’s more interest, there are more customers. If there are more customers, there’s more technical development. It’s a positive feedback loop and, obviously that’s good.”
What do you think about the Biebs going into space? Does it send a warm, fuzzy feeling to your atria, or are you hoping it’s a one-way trip?
[ Images via Metro UK & Huffington Post ]