THE elite club of astronauts is limited to just over 500 people. But if you’ve ever wanted to make the voyage yourself, it might only cost you US$10.

    The Urgency Network, a nonprofit startup, is behind several goodwill campaigns that use their connections to celebrities like Hugh Jackman, Paul McCartney, Thom Yorke and Richard Branson to offer donors unique experiences.

    The model of Urgency Network, founded by Donald Eley and Brandon Deroche, is pretty simple: Donate US$10 to a good cause, and you’ll be entered into a raffle to win an amazing prize. Each US$10 donation gets you another ticket, and after the first donation, donors can also volunteer for a variety of tasks to earn additional tickets.

    And now, thanks to the “Ticket to Rise” campaign, which benefits Oxfam, PETA and the Voice Project, that US$10 donation could land you a spot on an XCOR flight, one of two new ventures that will launch commercial space flights beginning in 2015.

    Needless to say, it’s quite a bargain. A standard ticket aboard the maiden XCOR flight costs between US$95,000 and US$100,000. The winning donor will take part in training exercises and medical screenings before the actual flight takes place and will then take part in one of the first flights, joining the crew 330,000 feet (100,584 meters) above the Earth’s surface aboard the XCOR Lynx Mark II shuttle.

    Deroche said that for each US$1 million the Urgency Network raises on the Ticket to Rise campaign, it will purchase an additional seat on an XCOR space voyage.

    “Space is going to be in the headlines a lot more once the commercial flights start,” Deroche said. “We wanted to be at the forefront of that conversation.”

    After shutting down its own shuttle program just a few years ago, NASA has been supportive of the effort to commercialize private space travel, calling it a “vital component to the future of human space exploration.” NASA has formed partnerships with companies like SpaceX to ship cargo and to transport astronauts aboard craft to destinations that may include the International Space Station.

    (SD-Agencies)