Space Science - The Future of Spaceflight

The role of getting people, satellites and other instruments into space is falling to private companies, especially with the retirement of NASA‰۪s space shuttle fleet in 2011. Reaching an altitude of 100 kilometers is required to be considered spaceflight. There have been just over 500 people that have reached this mark and only 24 have traveled beyond low Earth orbit. It is projected that within ten years, the number of people who will have flown into space will increase by about 600 percent due to the increasing market of sub-orbital spaceflight and the possibility of private citizens utilizing space flight. This program explains sub-orbital and orbital spaceflight and the requirements for vehicles to complete these journeys. With a behind the scenes look at many of the private companies involved in taking on the tasks to travel to low Earth orbit and beyond, this program uncovers some of the technology used to accomplish these goals.