Billionaire prepares to blast off

Published on Sunday 8 April 2007 00:19

RUSSIAN engineers were making final preparations last night for the launch of a Soyuz capsule bound for the international space station with two cosmonauts and US billionaire Charles Simonyi on board.

Meanwhile, Simonyi's friend, US lifestyle guru Martha Stewart, spent the final hours before the launch taking a stroll aboard another mode of transport commonly seen around the gritty Baikonur space port in the barren steppes of Kazakhstan - a camel.

"The ride was excellent," Stewart said, when asked about camel travel. "Baikonur is beautiful."

On Friday, Stewart shared a private moment with Simonyi - though only through a plate glass window, to protect him and his crewmates from germs.

Stewart's arrival in Baikonur inspired wide speculation that the two would announce their engagement before lift-off. They have been friends for about a decade, and some celebrity-gossip publications have suggested they are romantically linked.

Susan Hutchison, a spokeswoman for Simonyi, tried to end some of the speculation, saying Stewart was just a friend. "I can tell you that if he wanted to propose to her, he wouldn't do it through a glass window. He is extremely focused on space right now."

Simonyi, 58, a billionaire and the developer of Microsoft Word, paid more than $20m for a 13-day trip to the orbiting station. He is the fifth paying "space tourist" - or "space flight participant" - to make the trip.

Yesterday, as workers fuelled the rocket on which the Soyuz TMA-10 capsule sits, Simonyi and his travelling companions - cosmonauts Fyodor Yurchikhin and Oleg Kotov - met with experts and engineers for pressure tests on their space suits and medical tests.

In a posting on the blog he intends to maintain while in orbit, Simonyi said he had a final haircut and a therapeutic massage and watched a traditional showing of a classic Soviet-era war film.

Stewart has chosen the menu for a gourmet meal that Simonyi will be taking to the station as a treat for his comrades in space.

They plan a feast on Thursday, celebrated as Cosmonauts' Day in Russia after Yuri Gagarin became the first human in space on that day in 1961.

The menu includes quail roasted in Madiran wine, duck breast confit with capers and shredded chicken parmentier.

While at the space station, Simonyi will be conducting a number of experiments, including measuring radiation levels and studying biological organisms inside the laboratory.