Moscow — Dennis Tito will fly aboard the international space station next month, Russian officials insisted Tuesday, even though the United States and 14 other countries are arguing that the Los Angeles multimillionaire should wait.
Tito, a former rocket scientist turned money manager, has agreed to pay the Russians about $20 million to become the world's first space tourist and has been training alongside cosmonauts outside Moscow for the past eight months.
The Russian space agency said it has the right to select its own crew members for the station and it has chosen Tito.
"He must be launched and he will be launched," said Yuri Semyonov, chief designer with Russia's Energiya Corp. space enterprise, referring to Tito's planned flight April 30 aboard a Soyuz rocket.
A monthlong rift over Tito broke into the open Monday when the National Aeronautics and Space Administration barred him from a training session at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. The two-man Russian crew and two backups boycotted the session in protest. On Tuesday, Russian space officials ordered their cosmonauts to resume training.
No comments
Commenting is turned off for this story.