Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Soyuz With Richard Garriott Successfully Launched

Posted by Soulskill on from the lord-british-in-space dept.

Toren Altair writes "Soyuz TMA-13 with ISS Expedition Crew 18 and Richard Garriott successfully launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome at 7:01 UT (3:01 EDT). The Soyuz capsule will dock to the ISS in two days. Garriott will return to Earth with Expedition 17 crew members, Commander Sergei Volkov and Flight Engineer Oleg Kononenko on October 23." With the extra attention on this launch, the Russians have gone out of their way to say that the return of the Soyuz vehicle will be safe, after a couple of different malfunctions in the past year. Garriott is in space partly for recreation, and partly as a promotion for his latest MMO, Tabula Rasa. He took with him a hard drive filled with information about humanity, as well as DNA sequences from Tabula Rasa players and various celebrities (including Stephen Colbert and Stephen Hawking) to 'preserve' that data in case of a disaster on Earth. Garriott will also spend time running and participating in experiments. Coverage of the Soyuz mission is ongoing at NASATV.

2 of 56 comments (clear)

  1. so the father, so the son by SensiMillia · · Score: 5, Interesting

    On a side note,
    Richard Garriot, apart from being a successful video game writer, is in fact the son of a former NASA astronaut.

  2. Good for him by Bunderfeld · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I had the pleasure to meet Richard Garriot at E3 a few years ago.

    You would think some bigwig like Mr. Garriot would go out to eat, but no, he was standing in line with the rest of us schmoe's at the cafeteria.

    I didn't even take notice of who was who until someone asked if they could sit at the only empty chair across from me, to which I muttered "whatever" and went on reading my material. When I finally looked up, I was shocked to say the least. The interesting thing was that Mr. Garriot spent the hour and a half talking to me, laughing at his past antics, moaning about all that money he had to spend on his "castle sinking". Even when we were interrupted by the occasional fan asking for his autograph, this man never once got upset or even looked cross.

    I'm not much for meeting a lot of the Game Developer Gods, I've had my share of not-so-good meetings, but I will say "Good for you Richard", reach for the moon, if you miss, you will still be among the stars!