Back with a bump

US MILLIONAIRE scientist Gregory Olsen and a two-man Russian-American crew returned from the international space station to Earth yesterday in a swift, bone-jarring descent.

The touchdown of the Russian Soyuz space capsule on the cold, wind-swept steppes of northern Kazakhstan ended the third trip by a private citizen to the orbiting laboratory.

Mr Olsen, 60, appeared unaffected by the gut-wrenching trip home. “I feel great,” he said in both English and Russian.

He spent two years in training and paid $20 million (€16.6m) for his trip.

* China’s second manned space mission will be launched tomorrow morning, carrying two astronauts into orbit on a flight lasting several days, the government announced today.

A rocket carrying the Shenzhou VI space capsule will blast off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in the Gobi Desert of China’s north-west.