Tourism in Antarctica and Space

I have wanted to go to Antarctica ever since I can remember. It was always something that I never thought I would accomplish but always held out hope for. I not only made it to Antarctica within my lifetime, but I made it there before I turned twenty one!

I have wanted to go to space ever since I can remember. It is something I never would think to happen, but will always be something I hold out hope for.

Despite my desire to travel to both of these remote places, the growing concerns around sustainability, especially when it comes to human activity, is something that worries me. This is a growing concern for more and more people.

While I made it to Antarctica, this was only because of the rapid evolution of technology, even during my lifetime. There is a clear parallel between Antarctica and space, one that I was looking to explore on my voyage.

An Antarctic Expedition Leader’s Perspective on Space Tourism

During my time on the Ocean Victory, I got to know the expedition leaders that guided our Antarctic experience. They had a concern for, and commented on, the sustainability aspects of this kind of travel.

The desire for exploration and knowledge has been the driving factor behind many, if not all, aspects of human activity and evolution. However, a new challenge has presented itself in the current era; the Anthropocene. Climate change due to human activity has come to the forefront of conversation, especially in the context of exploration and travel. The line between exploration and travel continues to be blurred as technology advances.

Exploration is more research based while travel and tourism are usually more for pleasure. Antarctica is an ultra-remote location that, only relatively recently, was opened up to researchers to learn more about the history of the Earth. Since then, casual tourism to Antarctica has skyrocketed.

Space is just as remote to humans currently, as Antarctica once was. This provides a very unique connection between Antarctica and space.

After talking to Christophe Gouraud, an expedition leader on the Ocean Victory, it became clearer just how similar Antarctica and space are to each other. Technology associated with travel to Antarctica has improved significantly within recent history. As the safety of the technology has improved, it has made room for the sustainability aspect to become the main focus when it comes to frequent and casual travel to Antarctica.

While it is, of course, not perfectly sustainable, the most we can do as tourists is to become aware of the past, present, and future concerns, and share those with others. Because of advances in technology, tourism in Antarctica has become informational and provides an opportunity for participants to learn about the negative effects of human activity rather than just contributing to them.

However, the initial group of tourists to Antarctica were ultra wealthy. This is being seen in space exploration as well. Currently, only those who can afford it are able to tour space with a private company. This can pose sustainability problems from the frequency of rockets being launched and therefore, the fossil fuels being used and the greenhouse gases being emitted. This also eliminates the learning facet of tourism that can teach the general public about these remote places.

Space tourism has not advanced nearly enough yet to provide this kind of information to tourists, and then have that become available to the general public. Private industries and tourism appear to continuously be the next step for “out of reach” locations. We can see this significant transition in travel to Antarctica, and can already start to see that beginning in space travel as well.

My conversation with Gouraud was sparked when he shared that his ideal, next “big adventure” would be to the moon. Gouraud discussed how many trips and adventures he participates in regularly. This led me to ask if he felt space tourism is even “worth” it at this current moment in time. He believes that where space tourism is currently, it would not be beneficial to the exploration of space. While he believes space should be explored, he argues that traveling to space consistently would not be able to be done sustainably enough to counteract the reduction in research that would come from pure tourism. While he holds this desire to go to space, as do I, he thinks that it should be a research based mission and not a few minute trip to just briefly experience the feeling of zero gravity. I entirely agree with him.

Sustainable Extreme Tourism

All of the expedition leaders and crew on the Ocean Victory pride themselves in how sustainable this ship is in comparison to others on the market, in terms of carbon emissions. Regardless, it is not perfect.

The crew also took their time to teach all of us about these emissions and their efforts to promote sustainable solutions, and stressed the importance of sharing this knowledge with friends and family back home. With that being said, we can take what we learn from exploration and tourism in Antarctica and apply it to space.

We can see the negative effects of Antarctic tourism, and the burning of fossil fuels around the world, in Antarctica. The level of ice present for this summer season is lower than normal.

Humans are casually and consistently exploiting Earth for its natural resources. It can only be inferred that this will be repeated in space and on other celestial bodies in the future. Private industries have argued that space tourism is important to test out new technologies to eventually have a ferry system in between Earth and another planet “when” we become a multi planetary species. Gouraud’s argument is that with what we see human activity doing to Earth, it should not be allowed to happen on another planet as well.

On the other hand, space exploration is important because humans have an innate nature to learn, and Gouraud believes that should be satisfied. As a species, we crave knowledge and have the capacity to hold onto that knowledge. We can learn so much from studying space; from the history of Earth, our Solar System, the Universe, and even the future of all of those things.

Observing, learning about, and sharing its beauty with the general public is important in the same way as with Antarctica. If everyone can experience the beauty of space, people would be less likely to want to exploit it; which is the same in Antarctica.

Bringing Antarctica and Space Together

Antarctica and space are very uniquely similar. They are sensitive and remote areas that human activity could have drastic effects on. It is so important to explore and learn about these areas without disrupting its natural state of being. Now that I have experienced Antarctica’s beauty with my own eyes—as a tourist—I can share that experience with people back home, and even why it is important that it remains protected and remote.

I hope to be able to do the same with space; just not as a tourist.

Victoria Cava
Junior, Astrophysics