Millionaire 'tourist' blasts off

A Russian rocket lifted off today from the Baikonur cosmodrome carrying the first space tourist, Dennis Tito, and two cosmonauts to the International Space Station.

The Soyuz rocket blasted off from the barren steppes of Central Asia under sunny, blue skies, and disappeared into the clouds, leaving a trail of red flame and then a faint contrail.

The spaceship carrying Tito, a 60-year-old California businessman, was scheduled to dock with the ISS on Monday.

Until the eve of the launch, US and Russian space officials had argued about the overlap of the Soyuz rocket launch and the continued docking of US space shuttle Endeavour at the space station.

Computer problems have kept the Endeavour at the station longer than expected as astronauts try to carry out operations of a critical robot arm.

Nasa said docking the Russian spacecraft next to the US shuttle could be extremely delicate and potentially dangerous.