With a March
2007 spaceflight in hand, American space
tourist-in-training Charles Simonyi
celebrated with a launch of his own Thursday as he debuted a personal website
where he'll document his trek to the International Space
Station (ISS).
Simonyi
[image], 58, is now set to launch towards the ISS on March 9, 2007 aboard a Russian-built
Soyuz TMA-10 spacecraft that will also ferry two
Expedition 15 cosmonauts to the orbital laboratory. He plans to lay down
his training and flight experiences on the Internet at his website: www.charlesinspace.com.
"I want to
share all that I learn with everybody, especially with kids so that they may
become more involved with space sciences," said Simonyi, a former Microsoft
software developer and co-founder of Intentional Software Corp., during a
Thursday press conference at the Museum of Flight in Seattle, Washington. "I am
very honored and excited to be joining the Soyuz TMA-10 mission."
Simonyi's
trip is the result of a deal between Russia's Federal Space Agency and the
Virginia-based firm Space Adventures, which has arranged ISS-bound flights for
four paying customers - most recently U.S. entrepreneur Anousheh
Ansari - since 2001.
Previous
space tourist treks to the ISS were estimated to cost about $20 million, but
that price tag is rising to $25 million, Space Adventures president and CEO Eric
Anderson said.
"It will be
safe to say that Charles is paying a little more than $20 million, but not more
than $25 million," Anderson said during the briefing.
For his fee,
Simonyi will spend an intense six months training for a 10-day spaceflight that
includes eight days aboard the ISS. He will launch towards the space station with
Expedition 15 commander Fyodor
Yurchikhin and flight engineer Oleg Kotov, and return with Expedition
14 commander Michael
Lopez-Alegria and flight engineer Mikhail
Tyurin.
Unlike
Space Adventures' last paid ISS flight, there is no back-up spaceflyer
supporting Simonyi. Ansari
served as the back-up for Japanese businessman Daisuke Enomoto.
She flew
in Enomoto's place after he failed
a preflight medical check.
Simonyi has
passed all required medical checks with flying colors, Anderson said.
The
upcoming spaceflight appears to be the culmination of a lifelong interest for
Simonyi who--at age 13 in 1963--was selected as his native country Hungary's Junior
Astronaut and sent to Moscow, where he met cosmonaut Pavel
Popovich.
"Naturally I was interested
in space," Simonyi said. "I was so interested I learned the names of all the space
dogs."
A dedicated flyer, Simonyi
has racked up more than 2,000 hours piloting jets and helicopters and said his
family supports his upcoming space shot. He added that he will dedicate the
mission towards the advancement of civilian spaceflight while serving as a test
subject for biomedical experiments and working to inspire today's youth.
"Space is
an adventure," Simonyi said. "I think it is a very good hook to get kids
involved."
There is a
possibility that Simonyi's flight may be delayed to early April. The Russian
news wire service Ria Novosti reported last week that Federal Space
Agency officials were discussing whether to delay the mission to avoid the
flooding season at the Kazakhstan landing site where Simonyi and the Expedition
14 astronauts will touch down.
But NASA spokesperson Kylie Clem at the
Johnson Space Center told SPACE.com that those discussions are still ongoing
and far from final.
In the
meantime, Simonyi is due to head back to Russia's Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut
Training Center in Star City on Saturday to resume work.
"My
training is rigorous," said Simonyi, who is working hard to add Russian to the wide
ranks of languages in which he is fluent on top of his physical exercise. "I'm
really enjoying it."
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