Founded October 2013 | Type of business Private | |
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Industry Aerospace and Space Tourism Website www.worldviewexperience.com Headquarters Tucson, Arizona, United States Key people Mark Kelly, Jane Poynter (CEO), Taber MacCallum (CTO), Alan Stern (Chief Scientist) | ||
World view enterprises wants to take passengers to edge of space
World View Enterprises, Inc., or World View, is a private American near-space exploration company headquartered in Tucson, Arizona, that plans to use high-altitude helium balloons to gently lift people and scientific payloads twenty miles (approximately 32 kilometers) above earth for the purposes of space tourism, scientific research, and a wide range of other commercial applications.
Contents
- World view enterprises wants to take passengers to edge of space
- World view enterprises to organize near space balloon flights from 2016
- Key people
- References
World View plans to offer private citizens views of the curvature of the earth amidst the blackness of space from inside a pressurized space-rated vehicle suspended beneath a high-altitude balloon. The space-rated capsule, which will hold six passengers and two crew members, will ascend during a nominal flight profile to an altitude of 100,000 feet (20 miles, or 32 kilometers) above earth.
During a test flight in June 2014 World View successfully deployed and remotely navigated a parafoil back down to earth from an altitude of 50,000 feet.
An October 2015 test flight brought a 10-percent scale passenger capsule to over 100,000 feet altitude; a full-scale test is anticipated to follow.
A September 2016 flight carried a small, unmanned, scientific payload to an altitude of over 100,000 feet on behalf of the Southwest Research Institute through NASA's Flight Opportunities Program.
World View is planning to operate its commercial flights from Spaceport Tucson beginning in 2017.
World view enterprises to organize near space balloon flights from 2016
Key people
Jane Poynter, co-founder and CEO, was one of the original eight Biosphere 2 crew members. After two years inside Biosphere 2 (a three-acre, hermetically-sealed environment in the Arizona desert,) she went on to co-found Paragon Space Development Corporation, which designs and manufactures life support technologies rated for extreme environments, including outer space. Paragon has supplied hardware to more than 70 spaceflight missions, including ones to the International Space Station and Mir.
Taber MacCallum, co-founder and CTO, was also one of the original Biosphere 2 crew members and went on to co-found Paragon Space Development Corporation alongside Jane Poynter. Taber MacCallum was named Popular Science Inventor of the Year in 2008 for a toxic water diving suit that helps hazmat divers safely navigate contaminated waters.
Alan Stern, co-founder and Chief Scientist, was appointed NASA's Associate Administrator for the Science Mission Directorate, essentially NASA's top-ranking official for science, in April 2007. In this position Stern directed a US$4.4 billion organization with 93 separate flight missions and a program of over 3,000 research grants. He is also the principal investigator of the New Horizons mission to Pluto and the Chief Scientist at Moon Express.
Mark Kelly, World View's Director of Flight Crew Operations, is a retired NASA Space Shuttle Commander and U.S. Navy Test Pilot. During his tenure with NASA, he piloted two Space Shuttle flights and commanded two others, including Space Shuttle Endeavour on its final mission.
Ron Garan, Chief Pilot for robotic flight operations and upcoming human spaceflights, a retired NASA astronaut and fighter pilot.