TOKYO (AP) — Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa on Saturday canceled his planned flight around the moon on a SpaceX vehicle because of uncertainty about when it may be possible. The tycoon in 2018 launched plans for the lunar flyby voyage. He bought seats for eight traveling companions in 2022 for what would be his second space journey after his 12-day trip to the International Space Station on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft in 2021. Maezawa was aiming the moon trip for 2023, a target seen by most space observers as overly optimistic given the progress of SpaceX’s Spaceship mega-rocket project. It would have been the first private flight around the moon. That project became “unfeasible,” said the mission organizer on Saturday in a statement posted on its website. “Without clear schedule certainty in the near-term, it is with a heavy heart that Maezawa made the unavoidable decision to cancel the project.” |
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