IFG Leads Florida Pathfinder Flights Project to Promote for Space Tourism

InterFlight Global (IFG) has partnered with Starfighters Aerospace at Kennedy Space Center (KSC)  to lead, design, develop and conduct a Space Tourism Point-to-Point Pathfinder set of flight missions using Starfighters' supersonic F-104 jet aircraft. IFG intends to promote, develop, enhance and position Florida as the world’s leading Space Tourism hub.

IFG’s project is fundamentally an economic and tourism development enhancer through the use of Suborbital proxy flights. In addition to economic and business development gains to the State, the project will deliver meaningful suborbital transportation, tourism and experimental science and technologies. The missions will also mimic the flight profiles of multiple space tourism vehicles at multiple Florida spaceports, including NASA KSC, Cecil Field in Jacksonville, and Space Coast Regional Airport. 

"The project will involve economic and tourism development entities, regulatory agencies, spaceport operators and spaceflight companies in a comprehensive exercise to identify, understand and resolve infrastructure, touristic-visitors processes, operational and regulatory challenges that face the suborbital space tourism industry," said IFG Chairman,  Oscar S. Garcia, who is also a USDOT FAA-AST Commercial Space Transportation Advisory Committee (COMSTAC) full member and working group participant. "These challenges exist in every state, but with this project only Florida will have the confidence to say that it has taken the necessary steps to overcome them and create a Space Tourism highway poised for growth in the near and long term future."

Using funds provided to Space Florida for "space tourism marketing", the project would allow the state and its spaceports to market themselves as " wide open for business." In addition to space tourism, the project would also promote the development of future space transportation  point-to-point industries and activities,  for high value cargo like transplant organs, and test future approaches for space traffic management. Oscar S. Garcia is also Co-Chairman and interim Managing Director of Suborbital transportation leading group Fast Forward (www.fastforwardproject.com )