Singer Sarah Brightman to Become Space Tourist
British singer Sarah Brightman revealed on Wednesday that Russia will launch her as a space tourist to the International Space Station (ISS) in a multi-million dollar voyage aimed at "realizing dreams".
The soprano and crossover singer, 52, would be the first tourist to go into space after a hiatus in the space tourism program since 2009, on a ticket costing tens of millions of dollars.
"I am planning to become a space flight participant," Brightman told a news conference in Moscow. The schedule for her flight "will be determined very shortly by (Russian space agency) Roscosmos and the ISS partners," she added.
Brightman, known for her roles in West End musicals such as "The Phantom of the Opera", added she had been approved medically and will do six months training in Russia.
The commercial flights to the ISS for space tourists are organized through U.S.-based company Space Adventures, whose chairman Eric Anderson accompanied Brightman in Moscow.
"My journey is about realizing aims and dreams," Brightman said, playing up her role as a UNESCO artist for peace and raising the possibility that she might "sing a song from space".
"This voyage is a product of a dream, my dream. Finally it can be a reality. I am more excited about this than anything I have done in my life to date."
Brightman rose to fame in the 1980s with roles in the wildly popular musicals of composer Andrew Lloyd Webber, who became her husband. They divorced in 1990 with Brightman reportedly receiving a hefty settlement.
Alexei Krasnov, head of human spaceflight at Roscosmos, said that the task of taking Brightman into space is "fully achievable in the nearest future" and confirmed that she had no medical problems.
He refused to give the exact price of Brightman's ticket as a paying passenger, saying it is a "big, huge sum counted in the tens of millions of dollars."
The space tourism flights are expected to resume in 2013.
Previous space tourists visiting the ISS on a total of eight trips have included the Canadian founder of the Cirque du Soleil, Guy Laliberte, and Iranian-American entrepreneur Anousheh Ansari, so far the only woman.
"All the people who have flown with us in this category are people who are personalities in their area who have shown themselves and proved that they can do a lot," Krasnov said.
"I am sure Ms Brightman is from this category of talented, very determined people with the widest world view," he said.
Anderson said Brightman had moved to the top of the list of candidates to go to space because of her deep desire and interest in participating and because she is a great communicator.
Russia stopped taking space tourists in 2009 because of lack of room in its cramped three-person Soyuz space capsules that ferry astronauts to the ISS.
But Space Adventures said last year that it had signed a deal with the Russian space agency for three commercial passengers to book seats to the ISS per year as Russia plans to increase the number of Soyuz flights.
The last space tourist was Laliberte, who returned to Earth in October 2009 after an 11-day flight.
The first space tourist, Denis Tito, traveled to the ISS in 2001. All together, seven space tourists have taken part in missions.
Laliberte did not reveal the cost of his ticket, but his predecessor, U.S. software pioneer Charles Simonyi, paid $35 million for his trip.
