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Ex-Microsoft Billionaire Starts Space Tourism Training In Russia
Moscow (RIA Novosti) Sep 08, 2006 An American software billionaire has become the latest potential space tourist to start training outside Moscow, the Space Training Center said Thursday. Charles Simonyi, 58, a U.S. citizen of Hungarian descent and a key figure in developing Microsoft's Word and Excel applications, has signed a contract with Virginia-based orbital tourism firm Space Adventures this year for a 10-day science mission to the International Space Station in 2007. "Simonyi is seriously determined for the flight and he is ready for thorough and gradual preparations," a training center spokesperson said, adding that the first stage of the course would take three weeks. The source said Simonyi, who Forbes magazine put in 746th place in its 2006 list of the world's richest people, was remarkably different in his attitude to the flight from Daisuke Enomoto, a Japanese businessman who had failed his medical and appeared to be embroiled in a financial scandal in his homeland. Tehran-born U.S. citizen Anousheh Ansari has replaced Enomoto on the 14th mission to the ISS, which is to be launched September 18 on board Soyuz TMA-9. She will become the first female space tourist after two American men and one South African. Ansari's predecessors in space are believed to have paid around $20 million for the pleasure. The training center representative said it would be clear in 10 days whether Simonyi would have a backup. "The main thing is that he wants to learn more than is taught during the reduced 'tourist' course, which does him credit," he said. Related Links All about Space Tourism and more at Space-Travel.Com
Malaysia Unveils Two Final Male Astronaut Candidates
Kuala Lumpur (AFP) Sept 4, 2006Malaysia on Monday unveiled its first astronaut, a 34-year-old doctor who will blast off on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft and visit the International Space Station in September 2007. Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor was the winner of a nationwide hunt which drew tens of thousands of hopefuls. Army dentist Faiz Khaleed, 26, was chosen as the back-up astronaut, or "angkasawan" as they are known in the Malay language. |
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