For this desert gambling town it could become an odds-on favorite: Inflatable space modules. With company facilities spread out across some 50 acres here in North Las Vegas, Bigelow Aerospace is bankrolling big-time the private development of large space habitats. Extensive work is underway in designing and building partial and full-scale inflatable modules, fabricated to serve a range of users, from bio-tech firms and educational institutions to other groups wanting to churn out made-in-microgravity products.
July 8th, 2004
Bigelow, NASA now working together on space hotel Las Vegas Mercury
A mere five years ago, Bigelow, owner of the Budget Suites of America hotel chain, announced his intention to get into the space race. Not many people paid attention, or gave him much of a chance. But 16 months from now, Bigelow’s first creation is scheduled for blast-off into a low orbit above the earth. If it works as planned, the development of space will never be the same.
June 14th, 2004
An Inflatable Space The Statesman
If Robert Bigelow, the owner of the Budget Suites of America hotel chain, feels strongly about something, he goes for it. When the reclusive multimillionaire decided that he didn
May 24th, 2004
Bigelow Aerospace to Tackle Inflatable Space Habitats
Making “space available” is at the heart of the global travel, tourist and lodging industry. That business axiom is no stranger to Robert Bigelow, owner of the Budget Suites of America Hotel Chain. But now the North Las Vegas, Nevada-based Bigelow is putting his money down on inflatable Earth orbiting modules. He
May 14th, 2004
Bigelow signs contracts for Dnepr launches Spacetoday.net
Bigelow Aerospace, an American company developing inflatable orbital habitats, has signed a contract for six launches on a Russian Dnepr booster, Russian news services reported this week. According to the RIA Novosti news agency, Bigelow and Kosmotras, the company that markets the Dnepr, signed a contract at the Berlin Air Show this week for six Dnepr launches carrying what the report described only as “civilian satellites.”
May 6th, 2004
SpaceX announces first Falcon 5 sale Spacetoday.net
Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) announced this week the first sale of its medium-lift Falcon 5 launch vehicle. Company founder and CEO Elon Musk said that SpaceX has sold the first Falcon 5 launch to Bigelow Aerospace, a company developing inflatable structures that could be used as commercial orbital habitats. The payload, identified in a SPACE.com report as Genesis Pathfinder, is designed to test inflatable modules based on technology developed for NASA’s TransHab, a project the agency supported for several years before canceling. The launch is currently scheduled for November 2005 from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.
May 3rd, 2004
Talking with Steve Monroe The Gazette
Another client is Bigelow Aerospace, a Nevada-based company that has an office here in Bethesda that I share space with. It was founded by Robert Bigelow, a very wealthy man, who made his money in the real estate construction business in Las Vegas. He also had the space bug early in life … in his case, he was much smarter than I was. He decided to make a lot of money before he pursued his dream. In the latter part of the ’90s he did due diligence on a number of satellite and rocket companies. Ultimately he became enamored with a program at Johnson Space Center called Trans Hab that involved developing inflatable or expandable space modules. It means literally using fabric that could be expanded in space to build very low cost, high-integrity modules for housing research laboratories, space hotels, habitats on other planetary surfaces.
November 2nd, 2000
How inflatable spacecraft will work HowStuffWorks.com
As the space industry continues to cut costs by using lightweight materials and alternative types of energy, it is opening up the possibility that you and I may one day have the opportunity to live in space. The idea of a colony on the moon or Mars might be made possible with new spacecraft technologies being developed today. Inflatable space telescopes will be much lighter than their glass and metal predecessors, making them cheaper to put into orbit. (NASA) One of the remaining barriers to affordable space travel or even placing spacecraft in orbit is still the high price of launching these spacecraft. At today’s prices, it would cost $12,500 just to launch an object as light as an inflated basketball (1.25 pounds) into space. The heavier the spacecraft, the more rocket fuel is needed to get the vehicle off the ground. NASA and other space agencies are working on constructing a new breed of inflatable spacecraft made of lightweight materials.
November 16th, 1999
Plans in Works for Habitation in Space
It may be seen as the commercial parallel to Neil Armstrong’s “one small step”. Still others view it as breaking the NASA monopoly on human spaceflight.