WORLD NEWS | Saudi astronauts, including country’s first woman, head to space station on private flight

CAPE CANAVERAL (United States) May 22 (AP) — Saudi Arabia’s first astronauts in decades flew to the International Space Station Sunday on a multimillion-dollar charter flight.

SpaceX rolled out the ticket holders, led by a retired NASA astronaut who now works for the company that arranged the trip. Also on board was an American businessman who now owns a fleet of sports cars.

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The four should arrive at the space station in their capsule on Monday morning; they’ll spend just over a week there before splashing down off the coast of Florida.

With funding from the Saudi Arabian government, stem cell researcher Rayyanah Barnawi has become the country’s first woman in space. She was joined by Ali al-Qarni, a fighter pilot for the Royal Saudi Air Force.

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They were the first people from the kingdom to ride in a rocket since a Saudi prince launched in 1985 aboard the space shuttle Discovery. In odd timing, astronauts from the United Arab Emirates will greet them at the space station.

“It’s a dream come true for everyone,” Barnawi said before taking off. “Just being able to understand that it’s possible. If Ali and I can do it, so can they.”

Visiting staff include: John Shoffner of Knoxville, Tennessee, former driver and owner of a sports car team that races in Europe, and Peggy Whitson, the space station’s first female commander , she holds the U.S. record for the longest cumulative time in space: 665 days and counting.

This is the second private flight to the space station organized by Houston-based Axiom Space. The first was launched last year by three businessmen and another retired NASA astronaut. The company plans to start adding its own rooms at the station over the next few years, eventually tearing them down to form a free-standing outpost available for rent.

Axiom would not say how much Shoffner and Saudi Arabia paid for the planned 10-day mission. The company had previously quoted a ticket price of $55 million each.

NASA’s latest price list puts food at $2,000 per person per day and as much as $1,500 for sleeping bags and other gear. Need to send stuff to the space station ahead of time? That works out to about $10,000 per pound ($20,000 per kilo) and the same to throw it away afterwards. Need your item returned undamaged? Double the price.

At least email and video links are free.

Guests will have access to most areas of the space station to conduct experiments, snap photos of Earth and chat with schoolchildren returning home to demonstrate how kites fly in space while they hang from fans.

After decades of shying away from space tourism, NASA now plans two private missions a year. Roscosmos has been doing this on and off for decades.

“Our job is to expand what we do in low-Earth orbit around the globe,” said Joel Montalbano, NASA space station program manager. (Associated Press)

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