Wealthy adventure seekers can now book a vacation to the moon through a California startup that plans to open a hotel on Earth's celestial satellite by 2032. Space tourists eager to travel must make a hefty deposit of $1,000,000 to be among those who visit what the company calls “the first-ever permanent structure outside of Earth,” Space reports.
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Galactic Resource Utilization Space (GRU), founded by Berkeley graduate Skyler Chan, launched its booking website on January 12, revealing details of the hotel’s architecture. In a statement, the company said it will use “a proprietary housing module system and an automated process for converting lunar soil into durable structures” to meet the ambitious deadline. Construction is expected to begin in 2029, the company added, subject to regulatory approval.
The hotel's first customers are expected to be former commercial spaceflight participants and wealthy, adventurous newlyweds looking for an extraterrestrial honeymoon. The company believes tourism is key to a full-fledged lunar economy, providing “humanity's fastest path to interplanetary life.”
“We are living at a tipping point where we can go interplanetary before we die,” Chan said in a statement. “If we can do it, billions of human lives will be born on the Moon and Mars and will be able to experience the beauty of lunar and Martian life.”
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Chan is a 21-year-old graduate of the University of California, Berkeley, electrical engineering and computer science department who developed the idea for a lunar hotel as part of the Y-Combinator startup accelerator. Chan said he raised funding for the project from investors SpaceX, which has sent tourists into space, and Anduril, a company that develops autonomous defense systems.
A permanent base on the Moon is part of a vision for U.S. expansion into space, led by new NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman with the support of President Donald Trump.
Let us remind you that the first Ukrainian space tourist has also already traveled to Earth's orbit.
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