How to Build Your Own Spaceship: The Science of Personal Space Travel
Hotel magnate Robert Bigelow is developing an inflatable space station called the TransHab, where, for a mere $12 million, vacationers will be able to spend four weeks. All he needs is a space buggy to get his vacationers there. In this snappy survey of present-day rocket technology and schemes, science writer Bizony (The Rivers of Mars) tells readers where the action is. Internet entrepreneurs like AmazonÖs Jeff Bezos and Paypal founder Elon Musk are enviously regarding outer space with cool intellect and drawing up plans for spaceships. MuskÖs Falcon rocket reached space successfully, and his company plans to take satellites and other payloads into space for commercial and government customers. But not only billionaires can participate in the space race: both Bigelow and NASA are dangling prizes worth tens of millions of dollars in front of aspiring space moguls to spur creation of new technologies. BizonyÖs book is not a how-to manual with instructions for launching a rocket from the backyard. Rather, his descriptions of fuel systems and spaceship design in accessible language could inspire science buffs to take up the challenge. Illus.(July 28)Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.