Who Is The First Space Tourist In The World?

MirCorp, the company that financed the just concluded Mir mission, has registered its first paying tourist. News sources have extensively reported that the world's first space tourist was Dennis Tito, a 59 year old former-NASA employee turned millionaire who now manages Wilshire Associates in Santa Monica, California. The crew of Mir, cosmonauts Sergei Zalyotin and Alexander Kalery, departed for Mir on the evening of 15 June 2000 and landed somewhere close to the town of Arkalyk in Kazakhstan early in the morning of 16 June. Contrasting to all previous missions to Mir (or any other space station for that matter of fact), this mission was completely commercial. MirCorp continues to express the confidence in its ability to fund additional capital for future trips (such as Mr. Tito's) to Mir.