Space Tourist

Space Tourist Richard Garriott has returned safely from space and the International Space Station (ISS) after a 10 day visit. Gariott is the 6th official space tourist of record.

Richard Gariott is the first 2nd generation astronaut as he is the son of NASA astronaut Owen Gariott. On October 12, 2008 Richard Gariott launched aboard a Soyuz TMA-12 from Kazakhstan and returned on October 13, 2008 along with cosmonauts Sergei Volkov and Oleg Kononenko who had spent six months aboard the ISS.

Gariott is a Silicon Valley multimillionaire who made his money designing fantasy-style computer games. One criticism that Gariott had of the program is that he says NASA needs to be more open to the space tourism industry and encourage visitors in space.

According to Richard Gariott, “This mission to the ISS fulfilled a lifelong dream to experience spaceflight as my father first did 35 years ago. It’s an honor to be the first American to follow a parent into space. This experience made possible by Space Adventures – from my training in Star City, to lift-off, orbit and finally docking with and staying on the ISS – has been more gratifying than anything I could have ever imagined.”

While in space, Gariott did participate in NASA sponsored teleconferencing with HAM radio links, talking to students about his experience and experiments while onboard the ISS.

Chinese astronauts walked in space for the first time this past weekend. But did anyone notice? Noticeably absent was reporting from the mainstream media. There has been no Larry King special, no hoopla, just yawns for only the third nation in history to take a step out of the blue and into the black.

Zhai Zhigang, the commander of China’s Shenzhou VII spacecraft took a short walk in space for less than 15 minutes this past Saturday. The 68-hour voyage saw the spacecraft climb to 215 miles above the Earth’s surface. It was just 5 years earlier when China had its maiden spaceflight.

Taking off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in northwest China, the astronauts took the first steps towards building the Chinese space station of the future. Now, normally, I would reserve this blog for information about the space tourism industry.

But, China stepping into space for the first time is a big deal, a really big deal. It complicates the space race by putting another superpower at the table in regard to science, technology and military applications plus the possibility of the Big Red State entering the space tourism industry in a few years as well.

The Russians and Americans may have greatly this event with a big ole yawn. But, who will be yawning a few years from now when China has more people in space than Disney has riders at Space Mountain? Hey, it could happen.