Richard Garriott to be the next space tourist by Zuzana Zelenakova

Richard Allen Garriott, 46 years old American video game programmer and designer has decided to travel to orbit this fall. He will become sixth paying tourist in space. In October 2008 he will flight aboard Russian spacecraft Soyuz TMA-13 accompanied by two professional spaceflyers. He plans to spend some nine days aboard International space station (ISS} performing observation experiments and will return with Soyuz TMA-12. His flight is possible thanks to agreement between Russian Federal Space Agency and Virginia firm Space Adventures. For his stay in space Garriott is paying approximately 30 million dollars. Currently he is spending time in Russia getting ready. He must undergo medical checks and educate himself about Russian Soyuz spacecraft and ISS and also Russian language. "I have never learned a second language before," he said, "you just want to be able to participate fully and enjoyably, and I am gaining confidence that I can do that." Garriot says it has always been his dream to travel to space and it comes as no surprise as his father is a former NASA astronaut Owen Garriott, who flew with Skylab 3 and Space Shuttle mission STS-9. Garriott senior is going to take a part of the upcoming flight of his son as a chief scientist. "My dad will even tell you this is the hardest he has worked since he left the space program," said Richard about his father. Garriott also hoped to meet Russian cosmonaut Sergei Volkov, commander of the Expedition 17, with witch he should return on Earth. Like Garriott, he is also the second generation spaceflyer.

related story: http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20080122/sc_space/nextspacetouristbeginstrainingforspaceflight;_ylt=AqLlnVUJNY2H3g.JJbQmTN4PLBIF

by Zuzana Zelenakova for PocketNews (http://pocketnews.tv)

PocketNews is a new real-time news broadcaster delivering the latest and hottest news right to your pocket ! With global clients who want to be kept up to date, PocketNews is everyone's way of keeping in touch with the World.