Richard Garriott: Man on a Mission

Richard Garriott held a small video camera in one hand, capturing the moment as his Russian spacecraft re-entered Earth's atmosphere. His other hand then enters the frame, and points to wisps of smoke snaking out from under the ship's instrument panel, alerting his fellow crew members.

Signs of trouble? No worries, said Garriott. "The last two Soyuz missions had that happen, and they got back OK, so I figured we'd be alright." Minutes later, the capsule slammed into the ground, bouncing and rolling to a stop in a Kazakhstan field. Garriott had completed his mission as the sixth private citizen to travel into space.

Garriott shared his stories, videos, and photos on Saturday in a pair of presentations at Zachary Scott Theatre. Although the mission was in October, this was one of the first opportunities he's had to talk about his experiences with a large audience. Debriefings and travel have kept him away from Austin for all but the last two or three weeks, and he appeared eager to tell his story, graciously greeting guests and posing for photos.

The mission marked a personal milestone for Garriott, who has been dreaming of going into space since he was a child. His father, Owen Garriott, flew two missions for NASA, and everyone Richard knew while growing up in Houston was connected to the space program. But as a teenager, he was told that poor eyesight would keep him from ever being a NASA astronaut. That day, he began thinking of other ways to fly into space.

After making millions as the creator of the Ultima and Tabula Rasa game series, Garriott paid $30 million for the opportunity to train and fly with Russian cosmonauts.

Among the items he shared from the 12-day mission were the dramatic re-entry video, complete with a glowing orange plasma trail outside the porthole window, and the thud of the capsule hitting the ground. ("It felt like a car crash," Garriott said.)

While on board the International Space Station, Garriott participated in experiments in protein crystal growth, with hopes of determine the roles that specific proteins play in the human body, and had some fun as well, filming a science-fiction movie and doing magic for the crew.

Questions for the self-described "gentleman explorer" ranged from "How was the space station?" (messy and cluttered) to "How high up were you?" (about 250 miles) to "How do you go to the bathroom up there?" (Let's just say that solid waste disposal is an elaborate 45-minute process performed in an area the size of a phone booth.)

Now the first second-generation American to go into space, Garriott was clearly proud to have completed the most significant of his voyages, which have included trips to Antarctica and the Titanic. But he still bristles at the term "space tourist" and at NASA's description of him as a "space flight participant".

"I've gone through the same training and qualifications as they have at NASA", Garriott said. "I'm a fully-trained astronaut."