US space tourist blasts off for second space trip

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(Xinhua)
Updated: 2009-03-27 09:55

BAIKONUR, Kazakhstan -- A Russian capsule blasted off with a deafening roar on Thursday to carry U.S. billionaire Charles Simonyi into space for his second cosmic cruise.

Russian cosmonaut Gennady Padalka (top), US entrepreneur Charles Simonyi (middle) and US astronaut Michael Barratt wave before entering a spacecraft at Baikonur Cosmodrome March 26, 2009. [Agencies]

Ice shards broke away as the Soyuz rocket with a Russian-American crew lifted off from the Baikonur cosmodrome facility into overcast skies over northern Kazakhstan's barren steppe.

Simonyi, a 60-year-old software designer who paid $35 million for his second trip on the Soyuz, showed the thumbs-up sign to capsule TV cameras as his 28-year-old wife, Swedish socialite Lisa Persdotter, cried with worry on her mother's shoulder.

"I'm very, very happy. (The launch) was very, very smooth," Persdotter said as the rocket, a bright dot in the sky, gradually faded from view. "But I'm very emotional."

Among the scores of officials, relatives and reporters at the viewing gantry roughly a mile from the launch pad were Simonyi's former colleague and co-founder of Microsoft, Paul Allen.

Allen, who used his Microsoft fortunes to bankroll SpaceShipOne -- the first private, manned craft to reach space in 2004 -- said he planned to follow in Simonyi's footsteps, though he wasn't sure when.

"It's a few years off. This is serious stuff -- going into orbit.... I really wish Charles well. I missed Charles' first launch but I'm so glad to be hear for the second," he said.

Russian cosmonaut Gennady Padalka and American astronaut Michael Barratt joined Simonyi in the cramped vehicle, where they will sit for nearly two days before docking Saturday with the international space station, orbiting some 220 miles (350 kilometers) above the Earth.

Russian television showed footage of the crew and its mascot minutes before liftoff. A white plastic figurine of a snowman was seen hanging in front of Padalka's face.

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