Browse Sections

• Education
• Special reports

Star man predicts a space trip in five years

Ailsa Cranna
3/ 7/2008

SPACE cadets could be given a ticket to ride on Britain’s biggest rocket within five years - but only if they’ve got a spare £98,000.

That’s the message from Salford’s own Rocket Man Steve Bennett as he unveiled his 60ft Starchaser rocket at the University of Salford on Tuesday.

Steve, 44, the university’s director of space exploration, arrived at work to show off his 60ft Starchaser rocket, in front of the university’s Maxwell Building in The Crescent.

The £500,000 rocket has a capsule capable of carrying one person into the edges of space.

Both the tester capsule and rocket, constructed at Steve’s Starchaser workshops in Hyde, will be re-useable to keep down costs.

The cockpit has its own oxygen supply and a system for filtering carbon dioxide.

The solid-fuel device weighs 17 tonnes and will be capable of reaching sub-orbital heights 22 miles above the earth’s surface. Its descent would be slowed by parachute and the team have successfully tested the system by pushing the capsule out of a plane over a US desert.

Steve said: "This is a tester rocket which we will launch in 2009 to check safety features.

"The launch will be unmanned and probably take place in Morecambe Bay.

"If the safety tests all work out, they will be incorporated into a three-man rocket, currently under construction.

"That will be the one which will be taken into space with a pilot and two passengers."

A ticket on his passenger-carrying rocket will cost £98,000 for a 23-minute flight beyond the atmosphere.

Steve, 44, launched his Starchaser business 15 years ago with the aim of taking visitors into space.

The first two tickets for the proposed flights have been sold and 400 people have their names on a passenger list.