Sunday, November 23, 2008

Japanese Millionaire Too Eccentric For Outer Space

Would-be space tourist wants $21M back
(via smh.com.au):
"Japanese millionaire Daisuke Enomoto had planned to dress up as his favourite cartoon character in outer space and spent $21 million to make it happen. Now he claims the company that was supposed make his dream come true brushed him aside with little more than a 'sorry, no refunds.'

A federal judge heard arguments Friday in Enomoto's lawsuit against Virginia-based Space Adventures, a firm that made its name brokering deals with the Russian space agency to put half a dozen 'space tourists' in orbit for fees of $20 million or more.

Space Adventures wants the lawsuit thrown out, saying that Enomoto was disqualified because of a chronic kidney-stone condition. They say his money is nonrefundable.

Enomoto claims the kidney stones were an excuse and that he was not allowed to launch in part because he refused Space Adventures' demands for more money.

Enomoto, an eccentric entrepreneur who planned to dress up as anime character Char Aznable, had plans to be the first tourist to do a spacewalk.
He spent most of eight months at the Star City training facility near Moscow in 2006 preparing for his flight."
Just so you have an idea of what Char Aznable looks like:


And you wonder why he was rejected.

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