Japan billionaire Maezawa lands in Kazakhstan after 12-day space flight (updated)
20/12/2021 03:53
(Updates with details of touchdown)
By Shamil Zhumatov
ZHEZKAZGAN, Kazakhstan, Dec 20 (Reuters) - Japanese
billionaire Yusaku Maezawa returned to Earth on Monday after a
12-day journey into space, ending a practice run for his planned
trip around the moon with Elon Musk's SpaceX in 2023.
The 46-year-old fashion magnate and art collector, who
launched from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on Dec. 8
along with his assistant Yozo Hirano and Russian cosmonaut
Alexander Misurkin, landed on the Kazakh steppe.
Maezawa, a space enthusiast https://www.reuters.com/lifestyle/science/japan-billionaire-maezawa-fulfil-childhood-dream-with-space-flight-2021-12-07/#:~:text=Speaking%20from%20Baikonur%20ahead%20of,had%20been%20a%20childhood%20dream.&text=Maezawa%20will%20become%20the%20first,space%20travel%20for%20wealthy%20clients,
made the trip in a Soyuz spacecraft and became the first space
tourist to travel to the International Space Station (ISS) in
more than a decade.
One of Japan's most flamboyant public figures, Maezawa
entertained his social media followers from space by taking
photos https://twitter.com/yousuck2020/status/1472092424466059265?s=20
of his home prefecture of Chiba, showing how to make tea https://youtu.be/350KY7xhzLk
in zero gravity and discussing his shortage of fresh underwear
https://youtu.be/EGPN8kqfQik.
The entrepreneur returned to snowy conditions on Earth, with
precipitation and sub-zero temperatures at the landing site
about 150 km (93 miles) south east of the town of Zhezkazgan in
central Kazakhstan.
Maezawa will become the first private passenger on the
SpaceX moon trip in 2023, as commercial firms including Jeff
Bezos' Blue Origin usher in a new age of space travel for
wealthy clients.
The billionaire, who sold his online fashion business Zozo
3092.T to SoftBank in 2019, is searching for eight people who
will join him in his moon voyage in 2023, requiring applicants
to pass medical tests and an interview.
(Reporting by Shamil Zhumatov; Writing by Alexander Marrow and
Sam Nussey; Editing by William Maclean and Gerry Doyle)
((alexander.marrow@thomsonreuters.com;))