Asgardia: The First Ever Proposed Space Nation, To Shield Earth From Asteroids

During a press conference on Wednesday, a team of scientists, engineers and legal experts put forward a proposal to build the first ever nation in the outer space, called Asgardia.

The purpose of building up the nation of Asgardia will be to use it as a platform for people to work and live in space, aid the mining of asteroids and the protection of Earth from meteorites, space debris and other things that might cause any damage to human life on Earth, according to Inverse.

In the year 2013, the Chelyabinsk meteorite's crash over a major city in Russia that injured 1100 people and damaged approximately 4000 buildings just reminds us of the horrifying threat these natural objects pose to human life and property on Earth.

"Asgardia is a fully fledged and independent nation, and a future member of the United Nations - with all the attributes this status entails," explained Igor Ashurbeyli, Russian scientist and businessman who initiated the Asgardia project. "The essence of Asgardia is peace in space and the prevention of Earth's conflicts being transferred into space."

Igor aims at creating a space nation that is beyond the control and jurisdiction of independent nations. However, the current space laws state that the governments' ought to authorize and supervise any space missions that are being run from their country even if they happen to be commercial, according to The Telegraph.

Things are quite unclear about how exactly Asgardia is supposed to look like at the moment. But soon the project targets to launch a prototype satellite in fall 2017, so that it coincides with the 60^th anniversary of Sputnik's launch, and swiftly move ahead to build and launch a permanent, active space station in Earth's orbit that is supposed to act as a fully legalized nation.

Currently, Asgardia's central focus lies around getting its name out and raising funds. The project is offering citizenships to the first 100,000 people who register. It is even asking the public to help in the design of the national flag and national anthem.

Sources of Asgardia's funding are majorly unknown. Ashurbeiyli has put in his own money into the project but from where the project will get rest of its millions is not known. The estimated funds needed to reach the final target of building, launching and operating an independent space station will be close to $1 billion.

Though it seems to be a crazy idea, the success of this project could mean opportunities for a broader access to space, and enabling non-traditional space nations to achieve their scientific aspirations.