A Russian Soyuz spacecraft blasted off yesterday carrying a woman set to notch up three space records: the first female tourist, first female Muslim and first Iranian in orbit.
Anousheh Ansari, 40, an Iranian-American telecommunications entrepreneur, joined a Russian cosmonaut and US astronaut in the cramped interior of Soyuz TMA-9 for a flight to the International Space Station.
The Soviet-designed spacecraft lifted off with a roar of its rocket engine into a clear blue sky at 0409 GMT from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
"The launch was successful," Mission Control chief Vladimir Solovyov told reporters who had gathered in Moscow.
At an observation post about a kilometer from the launch site in the Kazakh steppe, Ansari's mother said in tears: "I am happy for her. I know she is very happy and I am praying with all my heart that she is coming back."
Unlike American Michael Lopez-Alegria and Russian Mikhail Tyurin, who are starting a six-month stint in space, Ansari will return to earth in 11 days with the outgoing US-Russian crew.
Ansari, a US citizen based in Dallas, Texas, who left Iran in 1984, has said she wants to be an example to her compatriots.
"I think my flight has become a sort of ray of hope for young Iranians living in Iran, helping them to look forward to something positive, because everything they've been hearing is all so very depressing and talks of war and talks of bloodshed," Ansari told reporters last week.
Meanwhile, women in Iran said yesterday that Ansari has motivated them to demand greater rights in the male-dominated country where ruling hardline clerics have chosen to restrict women's social roles.
"She is a symbol for women not only in Iran but all over the world. Her journey into space has revived hopes for [our] fight for equal rights in our land," said Iranian woman activist Fatemeh Farhangkhah.
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