South African internet tycoon Mark Shuttleworth has become the second person to pay for a trip in space after blasting off from Russia鈥檚 Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on Thursday.
The space enthusiast launched aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft, at 0627 GMT, along with two professional astronauts, Italian Roberto Vittori and Russian Yuri Gidzenko.
Shuttleworth will spend eight days as a paying guest aboard the International Space Station (ISS), a scientific endeavour operated by the US, Russia and other international partners. The Soyuz should dock with the ISS at 0757 GMT on Saturday.
Advertisement
House rules
The South African is following in the footsteps of US businessman Dennis Tito who became the first space tourist in April 2001. Tito鈥檚 trip was condemned by NASA, which argued that an untrained space traveller could endanger the rest of the crew.
The US space agency has since come round to the idea of paying space travellers and agreed to international regulations for such 鈥渟pace flight participants鈥�.
Shuttleworth has been keen to shrug off the tag of 鈥渟pace tourist鈥�. Although he has agreed to pay the Russian Aviation and Space Agency $20m for the trip, he has thrown himself into training and prepared scientific experiments to conduct during his time at the ISS. These include studies of sheep and mice stem cells and protein crystallisation in microgravity.
鈥淭his is a personal challenge and dream, but through that dream we鈥檝e tried to use space to provide a platform for science and education in South Africa,鈥� Shuttleworth told New Scientist a week before his launch.