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To: Jeffery E. Forrest who wrote (10089)	12/4/1997 1:22:00 PM
From: Moonray	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 22053

Travel group sells tickets for space voyage STANFORD, Calif. (AP) -- Space travel won't be just for astronauts any more, if arrangements to launch a spaceship with civilian passengers takes off as planned in 2001. The Stanford University Alumni Association, which has organized vacation trips to Antarctica and the jungles of New Guinea, is selling tickets to ride aboard a chartered spaceship. For $98,000 per person, travelers can float weightlessly aboard a six-passenger, rocket-launched space cruiser and watch spectacular views of the Earth. The university is working with Seattle-based Zegrahm Space Voyages to organize the 2 1/2-hour space flights. If all goes according to plan and the rocket builders deliver, the first launch will take place Dec. 1, 2001. The 2,300 mph cruiser would fly 62 miles above the Earth's surface, far enough from the planet's gravitational pull to achieve weightlessness in about two minutes, the promoters said. The space flight would complete a seven-day vacation package that includes advanced astronaut training and monogrammed personal spacesuits. Space travelers would also receive a video of the trip and take part in special ceremonies upon return to Earth. ''Some people have asked if we're serious, if this is a joke. But we've got alumni who are always looking for the unusual, so we decided to give it to them,'' Dennis Beardsley, the alumni association's director of travel-study programs, told the San Francisco Chronicle. Beardsley said he had been suspicious of prior proposals of space travel for paying customers, but that Zegrahm's plan seemed credible and feasible. The proposed two-stage space vehicle is to be built by Vela Technology Development, a Virginia-based aerospace company. About 20 reservations, worth $5,000 each, have been made for the flight, Zegrahm spokesman Chris Ostendorf said. He added that many of them are NASA employees who did not get to travel in space. o~~~ O