Dennis Tito waves to his family and friends from the bus transporting him to the launch pad - photo courtesy Space Adventures
The world's first 'space tourists'
Forget about being blasted off from a spaceport or dropped from a
mother ship.
The
first "tourist" was American businessman Dennis Tito. He
is reported to have paid Space Adventures $US20 million to be blasted
up to the International Space Station (ISS) on a Soyuz spacecraft
in May 2001.
South African
businessman Mark Shuttleworth was the next paying customer for Space
Adventures. His flight took place in April 2002. Mr Shuttleworth is
believed to have paid $20-25 million to become the first African in
space.
Greg Olsen became
the third private citizen to travel to the Space Station, while the
furth, - the world's first female space tourist, Anousheh Ansari -
completed a 10-day orbital mission in September 2006.
Former Microsoft
man, billionaire and master programmer, Charles
Simonyi, became the world's fifth space tourist in April 2007.
Up until July
2007, Space Adventure's paying "tourists" between them have
spent about a thousand hours aboard the International Space Station.