SpaceX won’t be sending a pair of space tourists around the moon this year, after all, but the unnamed couple who made a hefty deposit for the private lunar flight might get to take the trip the year after next, CNet reported.
The flight that was scheduled to take the two tourists whizzing past the moon later this year has been delayed until mid-2019, although it is unclear why the plans have been altered.
The trip was promoted last year by billionaire Elon Musk's company and drew global attention, but the excitement has died down.
In a statement made over the weekend, company spokesman James Gleeson confirmed the postponement of the private moon trip in an email to the Wall Street Journal, saying there was "growing interest from many customers" but he didn't offer details of when exactly the trip will take place.
The eventual mission will be made by the Crew Dragon, a new version of SpaceX's Dragon spacecraft that already is delivering supplies to the International Space Station.
Space X had said the spacecraft would embark on four missions per year to the International Space Station, three carrying cargo and one carrying crew, and then once Crew Dragon missions were underway for NASA, SpaceX would launch the private moon mission.
The moon missin delay comes as SpaceX is predicting a nearly 40 percent drop in launches for the next year, WSJ noted, after estimating there would be as many as 28 liftoffs in 2018.
While SpaceX is dealing with the slump, Musk has been fending off questions about reported struggles at his Tesla car business.
And last week the billionaire entrepreneur took some shots at the media during a flurry of tweets aimed at critics.
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