Former NASA astronaut Owen Garriott must be as proud as a father can be, as his son Richard is getting ready for his rocketing into space aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft thus becoming the world’s sixth space tourist and he will become the world's first second-generation astronaut as well. He will blast off from the Central Asian spaceport of Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on October 12.

Owen Garriot watched Friday how the rocket for the voyage was placed on a launch pad in Kazakhstan for its next weekend takeoff. At Richard's request, Owen Garriott, retired from NASA, will act as the chief scientist for his son's flight.

Nevertheless Richard Garriott, 47, won’t just fly into space as a plain tourist, but rather as a rookie astronaut whose mission includes snapping nearly 500 pictures of Earth and participating in a series of experiments that will test spaceflight's impact on his eyes (his vision was too poor for him to become an astronaut), immune system and sleep patterns. "I'm a devout believer in scientific, statistical study," Garriott says. He cites the Soyuz's 35-year history without a fatality as reason for his nonchalance.
"There's no question that I learned what I'll call that scientific approach from my father." Owen Garriott was a two-time space traveler who took extensive photographs of the Earth's surface during his stay on the U.S. orbital station Skylab in 1973.

The son of a U.S. astronaut, millionaire Garriott made his fortune in online computer games, including the popular Ultima Online He paid $30 million to become the sixth space tourist to travel to the International Space Station.