We first heard about Florida-based company Space Perspective back in 2020, when it first announced its intention to take batches of eight paying passengers (and one pilot) on six-hour flights up to an altitude of 100,000 feet (30,480 m). At that height, the curvature of the earth and the blackness of outer space are clearly visible.

The passengers would ride in a pressurized capsule called Spaceship Neptune, which would hang beneath a hydrogen-filled "football stadium-length SpaceBalloon." It would take two hours to reach altitude, followed by two hours of sightseeing, followed by another two hours to descend. In order to do the latter, gas would slowly be released from the balloon