What a blast: Russian rocket lifts off carrying Japanese billionaire to ISS
- Online fashion tycoon Yusaku Maezawa and his assistant were launched from Russia-leased Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan
- The 46-year-old billionaire aims to complete 100 tasks while on board, including hosting a badminton tournament in orbit and sharing daily life on YouTube
A Russian rocket lifted off carrying a Japanese billionaire to the International Space Station, marking the country’s return to space tourism after a decade-long pause that saw the rise of competition from privately held US companies.
Online fashion tycoon Yusaku Maezawa and his production assistant Yozo Hirano blasted off from the Russia-leased Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 07.38 GMT on Wednesday.
Their journey aboard the three-person Soyuz spacecraft piloted by cosmonaut Alexander Misurkin will take just over six hours, capping a banner year that many have seen as a turning point for private space travel.
On launch day, Maezawa and his crew left their hotel in Baikonur to a Soviet-era song played for all cosmonauts ahead of their flights. The song, about cosmonauts missing home, was sung partially in Japanese. Maezawa’s family and friends – some holding Japanese flags – waved him off as he was driven to get his spacesuit fitted.
“Dream come true,” the tycoon tweeted on Wednesday morning.
Fellow billionaires Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson all made breakthrough commercial tourism flights this year, bursting into a market Russia is keen to defend.