[gargravarr]

No question that this idea would be pure hell on a cramped plane in cattle-class. There's even mention in the article that, yes, the plane can manage the flight, but even with a full fuel load they can't spare the weight of more passengers and cargo. It seems completely disconnected from the real world, which, okay, it's mostly science at this stage and looking at severe jet lag from such a long flight. The implication is that it's nowhere near ready for the masses and is a curiosity at best.

The most I've managed on a plane is a 12-hour flight from London to Hong Kong, and that's enough. Nobody will be able to afford beds on such a flight except the ultra-rich, and that's assuming you can sleep on planes at all (I can't). In an era where fossil fuel emissions are dangerously damaging the planet, this is also a strange time to unveil such a concept as we need to fly less. On the other hand, versus a a stopover flight, if you're flying this distance, doing it in one go is much more fuel-efficient as the plane spends far longer in the upper atmosphere reducing drag, and only burns take-off fuel once. But this isn't something that needs to be offered to the masses if there genuinely is a market for it.

Even if a 20-hour-long flight was completely harmless to both physical health and the environment, I cannot think of anything I would rather do less than sit in a tin can at 40,000 feet for that duration.