Training for a private astronaut beginns by Andrea Halastikova

A computer game developer Richard Garriot, who paid for his ticket to space 30 millions dollars, will be travelling into orbit in October 2008 to fulfill his lifelong dream. An American space tourist has began his training at the Yuri Gagarin Training Center in Star City, Russia in preparation for a mission to the International Space Station (ISS). "I am quite excited to be in training now and I look forward to all aspects that it will entail," said Richard Garriot. He is the sixth private citizen to reach suborbital space.As the son of former NASA astronaut Owen Garriott he was raised in a NASA home. Going to space is the only stone left for this explorer and a lifelong dream. He is a man, who experienced the icy Antarctica to the watery depths of Titanic. Just because he paid his own way to space he doesn't like to be called space tourist. "I will have worked just as hard to get there and I will be doing work I consider just as valuable in orbit. So please just call me a private astronaut or cosmonaut," he said. His flight will also accommodate commercial activity aboard the ISS. It will include scientific and environmental research and educational outreach programming.The preparation already has been underway for some time. He has already had to go through medical tests, which included psychological tests. For this upcoming time, most of his actual training will be pretty significant and serious, starting with things like survival training just in case the capsule comes to the ground off target.

related story: http://washington.bizjournals.com/washington/stories/2008/01/21/daily4.html

by Andrea Halastikova for PocketNews (http://pocketnews.tv)

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Edited by: Katarina Bosanska