Rocket carrying U.S. space tourist lifts off for space

A Soyuz spacecraft with two Americans and a Russian on board lifted off from Kazakhstan on Sunday for the international space station.

The Soyuz TMA-13 capsule carrying American computer game millionaire Richard Garriott soared into a clear sky atop a Russian rocket as the latest paying space traveler’s family watched from a viewing platform. Also aboard were U.S. astronaut Michael Fincke and Russian cosmonaut Yuri Lonchakov.

“I’m elated, elated,” said Richard Garriott’s father, Owen, a former U.S. astronaut who is the first American to see his child follow in his footsteps and reach space. “They’re in orbit, that’s good.”

Garriott’s mother Eve and his girlfriend, Kelly Miller, shed tears of joy and relief at the successful launch.

-From Associated Press reports