Russian space officials have announced the go ahead for American multimillionaire Dennis Tito’s flight to the space station via a Soyuz-TM taxi flight.
According to a report carried by TASS early Wednesday, the flight is scheduled for liftoff April 28 that will carry Tito along with Russian cosmonauts Talgat Musabayev and Yuri Baturin.
Quoting sources in the Russian National Space and Aviation Agency Rosaviakosmos Tass reported that during the course of recent discussions with NASA, the principal concern was not so much about Tito’s visit to the ISS, but more with establishing ongoing procedures for sending space tourists to the space station.
NASA remains opposed to the flight, but realizes it has little option but to accept the unilateral move by Russia to commercialize the station ahead of its own belated commercialization plans.
Meanwhile, the Virginia-based tourism company which organized Tito’s flight to ISS, Space Adventures, is open for business with its website touting for new customers with a spare $20 million to take the Soyuz taxi to ISS.
