Space tourist braves dangerous Soyuz ship
For $30 million, Richard Garriott gets two weeks in space and a risky ride home.
— -- The last two trips back to Earth by Russian spacecraft were not for the timid. Plunging to the ground on an alarmingly steep path, the ships landed hundreds of miles off course after subjecting crews to a ride so rough they found it hard to breathe.
Richard Garriott will come home on one of those Russian ships — and he's paying for the privilege.
Garriott is the sixth person to buy a ticket to space himself. Like his predecessors, he'll spend two weeks living on the International Space Station after forking over $30 million of a fortune he made designing computer games.
Unlike other space tourists, he'll come home on a vehicle with a newly troubled history. Even so, Garriott professes not to be worried.
"The Soyuz is truly a wonderfully built craft (with) a long series of backups," says Garriott, 47, who blasts off Sunday. "I'm extremely confident in trusting this vehicle with my life."
Coolness in the face of risk runs in the family. Richard's father Owen Garriott, 77, was an astronaut who lived on NASA's Skylab space station, flew on the space shuttle and was an "absolute rational thinker," says his son. That trait rubbed off.
"I'm a devout believer in scientific, statistical study," Garriott says. He cites the Soyuz's 35-year history without a fatality as reason for his nonchalance. "There's no question that I learned what I'll call that scientific approach from my father."
He recounts listening to Mission Control in 1973 as a child when one his father's spacecraft ran into trouble with its thruster jets. The older Garriott didn't get alarmed, so his son didn't either. The father made a safe landing.
The last two Soyuzes — one in October of 2007 and one in April, — touched down safely but not before subjecting their passengers to a harrowing ride. Both crews suffered eight times the force of gravity, twice as much pressure as during a normal landing.
A Russian investigation found that the three segments of the spacecraft did not separate properly. Normally the pieces separate early in the descent, and the crew cabin falls to Earth by itself.
