Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/09/27/astronaut-christina-kochs-in.html
…
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But the earth doesn’t appear flat…
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That is awesome.
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Amazing image.
Space flight is one of the few things that give me at least a little hope for mankind.
Ad astra per aspera
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What. The. Funk.
That is the most amazing picture I’ve seen since the black hole image. In fact, it probably ties that one for the most amazing picture I’ve ever seen.
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wait wait wait wait wait a minute
United Arab Emirates spaceflight participant Hazzaa Ali Almansoori
Is that a slide it by us way to say “fucking rich space tourist”?
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Non solum per aspera, sed per ardua!
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As Christina took the photo, the ISS’s little astrobee robot – its virtual tail wagging – floated over to the observation window. “Who is it?! Who is it?! Will they play with me?!”
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ok - he is a pilot and trained in his countries astronaut program- he’s not simply a privileged rich guy. Whew.
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dafuq… look at the size of those chemtrails!!!
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Very Kubrick’s 2001.
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I repeat myself, but man…
All hail William Gibson, seer and prophet of these techorrific days!
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We can’t wait to welcome you onboard, crew of Soyuz 61!
Ah, so this is why we never hear of space launches anymore.
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I came here to comment, “Fucking awesome”. 
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They need to step up their naming game. I propose alfaraghanaut, which sounds suitably badass.
That’s how we know it’s fake! 
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That’s one for the ages, truly magtabulous.
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Instant classic, as they say.
No.
The category “Spaceflight Participant” is a catch-all for all space travelers who are not career astronauts.
And while “self-funded tourists” do fall into that category, so do several other groups, including some NASA payload specialists, some Russian researchers and scientists, and political guests (senators and congressmen and US-ally guests, and Warsaw-pact and other guests of the Russians).
Teacher In Space program participant Christa McAuliffe would have been a “Spaceflight Participant” but for the Challenger accident.
Hazaa Al Mansouri is a veteran pilot with the UAE air force, and his flight is a partnership between Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, and the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre, a UAE government space agency.
It’s entirely possible (quite likely, in fact) that the UAE is paying Russia for the cost of Al Mansouri’s training and flight, but Al Mansouri himself is not a rich-guy tourist.
Travelers from 41 different nations have been to space on Shuttle and Soyuz flights to an assortment of space stations over the years. There have been eight self-funded tourists to the ISS, all hosted by Russia.
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