Exclusive tour lets you go inside the Russian Space Program

by Melanie Renzulli on




If you missed your chance to sign up for Space Camp or just want a closer look at the Russian approach to space exploration, an exclusive tour inside the Russian Space Program this fall may be for you. Operated by the Mir Corporation (no relation to the former Russian Space Station), Inside the Russian Space Program will give you a near-space experience with opportunities to see a manned Soyuz launch and tour a mock-up of the International Space Station (ISS), among other activities that are far beyond the reach of most travelers.The 10-day, $14,000 tour scheduled for October 9-18, 2012, is led by Dr. Steven Lee of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science and provides exclusive access and insight into Roscosmos, Russia’s Space Program. Sandwiched between tours of Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center and Mission Control in Moscow, the tour will include a trip to Baikonur, Kazakhstan, where participants can get behind-the-scene glimpses of the manned Soyuz rocket launch to the International Space Station. For an extra fee, travelers can sign up to attend Cosmonaut training, which includes a familiarization ride on the world’s largest centrifuge, a zero gravity flight, and a chance to wear a Russian Orlan space suit.

Although this is very much a 21st century tour, some of the activities on the itinerary can’t help but hearken back to the days of the Soviet Space Program, thereby making this a fascinating tour for Cold War history buffs. To wit, there are excursions to the Star City Museum, which has a reproduction of Yuri Gagarin’s office among other rockets, satellites, space capsules, and simulators; the Cold War Museum Bunker; the Gagarin Start, the original launchpad from which the Sputnik missions launched; and the Novodevichy Convent and Cemetery, where famous Russians, such as Chekhov and Khrushchev, as well as a number of cosmonauts are buried.

Video: cosmic time-lapse, ‘Temporal Distortion’

by Elizabeth Seward on

“Temporal Distortion” from Randy Halverson on Vimeo.

If you’re in the mood for taking a beautiful, cosmic, time-lapse break, consider this your opportunity. The gorgeous time-lapse images that make up this short film (which is part of a 23 minute expanded version) feature the Milky Way, Aurora, and plenty of other Earthly delights. An original score by renowned composer Bear McCreary accompanies this piece. McCreary has scored “Battlestar Galactica” and “The Walking Dead,” among others. We’ve featured other time-lapse work from Randy Halverson. If you like this video, be sure to check out his Milky Way time-lapse as well as his South Dakota winter time-lapse.

Training shuttle to be displayed in Seattle’s Museum of Flight

by Sean McLachlan on


It looks like the Space Shuttle, but it isn’t. It’s made of plywood, for one thing, and it can’t fly.

Yet it’s a piece of aeronautics history and will soon grace Seattle’s Museum of Flight. This training shuttle, more properly called the Full Fuselage Trainer, is a full-scale mockup that astronauts have used for practice since the 1970s. The museum originally hoped to get one of the four actual Space Shuttles, but those went to other museums. The advantage of the training shuttle, however, is that visitors will be able to climb aboard and get a feel of what it must have been like to go on a mission.

The shuttle will be flown to Seattle in five segments starting in May and should be open to the public sometime in June, the Seattle Times reports.

The Space Shuttles are going to four different museums. The Atlantis will go to the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Center in Florida. The Endeavour will go to the California Science Center in Los Angeles. The Discovery is earmarked for the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum’s Udvar-Hazy Center in northern Virginia. The Smithsonian will transfer the shuttle prototype Enterprise to the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum in New York City.

Photo courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Video of the Day: Making tacos in space

by Mike Barish on

Preparing your own meals while on the road can be tough. You don’t always have a proper kitchen stocked with all of the tools and appliances that you need. Ingredients can be difficult to find. Still, at least we always have gravity to help us out. Not so for astronauts. When it’s dinner time, they have to assemble their tacos in zero gravity. The last thing that anybody wants is refried beans in the ventilation system. Think of this guy and his space taco the next time you want to complain that the kitchen in your RV is too cramped.

Space Tourists: a cinematic journey to the ISS (w/ Audio Interview)

by Stephen Greenwood on

Space Tourists airs tonight on the Documentary Channel at 8pm & 11pm


When Anousheh Ansari boarded the International Space Station on September 20th, 2006, she became the first self-funded female, the first Iranian citizen, and the fourth human overall to enter the Earth’s orbit as a coveted ‘space tourist’.

After building and selling a large telecom business, Ansari had decided that she would pay over $20 million USD to take a ride on the Russian Soyuz TMA-9 and orbit Earth as a crew member of the International Space Station for 8 days. While training as a backup for Daisuke Enomoto, who failed to meet the required medical qualifications, Ansari was notified that her lifelong dream would be fulfilled – with only one month remaining before liftoff.

Meanwhile, without Ansari’s knowledge, a charismatic Swiss filmmaker had begun to collect material for a documentary that explored the peculiar circumstances of the Russian space tourism industry. Gathering footage at the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, Russia and at the Baikonur Cosmodrome (the Soyuz’s launch facility), filmmaker Christian Frei began to lay the foundation for what would become the first documentary to uncover a highly exclusive and secretive world.

The finished product, Space Tourists, debuted in the US at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival. Thought it never had an overwhelming reception in North America, it is arguably one of the most fascinating travel-themed documentaries to have been produced in recent years and a must-see for anyone with a sense of adventure or a distant dream of venturing to space.

Frei’s film uncovers many facets of the Russian space tourism program that are especially compelling to watch unfold on the big screen.

From the pre-launch rituals at the Baikonur Cosmodrome, to the group of men that make a living by hunting down and recovering the enormous scrap metal that falls to Earth from every Soyuz launch; Frei’s film captures an incredible spectrum of physical environments, people/cultures, and brilliantly contrasts the magnificence of spaceflight in direct contrast with the trivial hardships of life on Earth.

It’s a film that’s both visually arresting and offers to bring the viewer on a journey with each of the characters that it follows – from training to touchdown and everywhere in between.

Space Tourists is currently being featured on the Documentary Channel airing tonight at 8pm and 11pm, or available on DVD via the Documentary Channel online store.

Click below for an exclusive, uncut interview with Anousheh Ansari & filmmaker Christian Frei: