A
former astronaut's son blasted off on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft toward the
International Space Station on Oct. 12, 2008.
Richard
Garriott is a 47-year-old computer video game pioneer and son of retired NASA
astronaut Owen Garriott. He flew
aboard a Soyuz TMA-13 spacecraft with new station crewmembers Michael
Fincke and Yury Lonchakov, after signing on with Space Adventures as a
space tourist. However, Garriott also plans to conduct a variety of scientific
and educational experiments aboard the space station.
The
spacecraft docked with ISS on Oct. 14, 2008. The current crew consisting of Expedition 17
commander Sergei Volkov and flight engineers Oleg Kononenko and Greg Chamitoff
welcomed their first
visitors since June. Volkov and Kononenko will return to Earth on Oct. 23
with Garriott.
— SPACE.com Staff
Credit: NASA/Bill
Ingalls
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