Russia Soyuz Hauls American, Richard Garriott, into Space

Richard Garriott, a US video game magnate went into space aboard a Russian rocket on Sunday. Garriott’s father is a former NASA astronaut during the Cold War. The senior Garriott spend 70 days total in space, 60 in ‘73, and 10 in ‘83.

Garriott paid $35 million to live out his dream of acting out in real life what people only imagine in video games.

Garriott traveled into space with US astronaut Michael Fincke and Russian cosmonaut Yury Lonchakov.

Garriott will be back in 10 days traveling aboard a Soyuz re-entry vehicle, which has malfunctioned on the last two re-entries.

1. a failure of explosive bolts caused one to land 420km off course.

2. a similar failure caused a second Soyuz capsule to make a ‘ballistic’ landing.

Perhaps Garriott’s capsule will be protected by video game force fields and such.

I can imagine Garriott’s astronaut father telling the younger that he’d never amount to anything.

Funny, what $35 million can get you to amount to, eh?