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"Moving Stars and Earth for Water"
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On September 30, 2009, a civilian became a spaceflight participant aboard
Soyuz TMA-16, a manned flight from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan
to and from the International Space Station (ISS). Joining two members of
the Expedition 21 crew – Russian cosmonaut Maksim Surayev (Commander, from
the Russian Federal Space Agency, FSA) and NASA Astronaut Jeffery Williams
(Flight Engineer) – was Guy Laliberté, who paid approximately $35 million
USD for his seat through the American firm Space Adventures, becoming the
first Canadian space tourist in the process. Space Adventures as you may
or may not know, offers a variety of programs, such as: Orbital spaceflight
missions to the International Space Station (with an option to participate
in a spacewalk), Circumlunar missions around the Moon (although none of
those have taken place), zero gravity flights, cosmonaut training programs,
spaceflight qualification programs, and reservations on future suborbital
spacecraft.
Since 2001, Space Adventures has launched seven clients on eight
successful missions to the International Space Station (ISS): In April
2001, the company sent American businessman Dennis Tito for a reported
$20 million payment, making him the first space tourist. South African
businessman Mark Shuttleworth did the same in April 2002, becoming the
first African in space. Gregory Olsen became the third private citizen
to travel to the ISS in October 2005, followed by the first female space
tourist, Anousheh Ansari, who completed her 10-day orbital mission in
September 2006.
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| Launch: | Sep 30, 2009, 07:14:45 UTC |
| Rocket: | Soyuz FG |
| Site: | Baikonur 1/5 |
| Landing: | Oct 11, 2009, 04:32:10 UTC |
| Missions: | Soyuz TMA-16 / TMA-14 |
| Time: | 10days, 21 hours, 17 minutes |
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Charles Simonyi, an ex-executive at Microsoft, became the
fifth space tourist who visited the ISS in April 2007, then again in March
2009. (He is the world’s first private space explorer who launched to space
twice.) In 2008, game developer Richard Garriott, the first second-generation
U.S. astronaut, became the sixth client to travel to the ISS. And lastly
(as of this writing), Cirque du Soleil founder Guy Laliberté.
TMA-16 was the 103rd flight of a Soyuz spacecraft, the first launching
in 1967. To say it’s the Russian’s space work-horse is an understatement;
it’s been quite reliable. Soyuz is the third Soviet human spaceflight
program after the Vostok and Voskhod, and is directly comparable to NASA’s
Apollo program of the same era (making Vostok the 1-man capsule comparable
to Mercury, and Voskhod the 2-man capsule comparable to the Gemini program).
In fact, Soyuz was originally developed by the Soviet Union as part of a
moon landing project, intending to put Soviet cosmonauts on the Moon,
which, alas, didn’t happen. However, the launch of Soyuz TMA-16 marked
the first time since 1969 that three Soyuz craft were in orbit
simultaneously – Soyuz TMA-14 was launched on March 26, 2009 (and consequently
was the craft Laliberté returned in on October 11, 2009), Soyuz TMA-15 was
launched on May 27, 2009 (returning December 1, 2009), and TMA-16 (which
returned with another crew on March 18, 2010).
Besides fulfilling a life-long dream, Laliberté’s spaceflight was
dedicated to raising awareness on water issues facing humankind on planet
Earth, making his spaceflight the first – in his words – “poetic social
mission” in space. And much of this experience was captured on film and
recently spun into a feature-length documentary entitled TOUCH THE SKY.
While the documentary is a compelling visual look into the experience,
the adventure was also captured by Laliberté himself in the form of an
online journal. Thus in this series we’ll be taking a look back at Guy’s
Poetic Social Mission through his eyes, from the journal, in monthly
installments, taking you through the initial steps Guy undertook all
the way through to the launch and landing.
Buckle up, Rocket Men.
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