Boeing’s space taxi includes seat for tourist

Boeing Co.’s space taxi to carry astronauts to the International Space Station includes a seat for paying tourists. A Boeing executive told Reuters the price of a trip into space would be competitive with what the Russian space agency charges tourists, which is about $50 million.

Chicago-based Boeing won a $4.2 billion contract this week from NASA to develop a spacecraft to ferry astronauts to the space station. SpaceX also won a $2.6 billion contract to build a space taxi.

NASA has set a goal of 2017 for the first launch under the commercial crew program. Both companies will use crew capsules. Launches will originate from Cape Canaveral.

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