Official News page 9

REAL LIFE NEWS: NO MORE SPACE TOURISTS

by Hazed

If you're a billionaire who was looking forward to spending money on a trip to the International Space Station, you may have left it too late. The chief of Russia's space agency has announced that there will be no more space tourists after 2009, because there won't be any room for them. Plans to double the full-time crew on the ISS will leave no space for civilians, no matter how rich they are.

The last commercial flight will be the one that takes Vladimir Gruzdev, a cosmonaut from the ex-Soviet republic, up to the station sometime in the fall.

This year, the plan is to double the resident crew on the ISS, from three to six people. This means more experiments will be able to be done. NASA's Endeavour mission sent up additional quarters and equipment for the extra crew members - but no spare bedroom for guests.

So, billionaires, you'll just have to find some other space-related enterprise to spend your money on. I know - how about buying some slithy toves to help fund Fed?

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