$20 Million for Orbiting Latrine Duty?

Despite pressure from NASA to back off, California millionaire Dennis Tito is pressing ahead with plans to take a joy ride aboard the international space station as the world’s first space tourist.

Russian space officials have guaranteed him a seat aboard a Soyuz rocket to the space station in exchange for up to $20 million, and Tito said he is certain he will be on board when it blasts off April 30.

“I’m not a spoiler here,” the 60-year-old investment tycoon and former rocket scientist said Friday in a telephone interview from his office at Wilshire Associates in Santa Monica. “I’m not trying to screw up the relationship between the partners.”

“I have a different view of the direction of our space program,” he added, “and maybe when I get back I’ll be able to have some influence, politically, to help change it.”

Tito said his flight will open up opportunities for other paying customers.

Tito and his Russian crewmates are scheduled to arrive at the space station May 2 and depart six days later.

He spent months training in Russia for the mission. His ticket originally was to Mir but was reissued last year when Russia decided to junk the 15-year-old station. It went down in flames over the South Pacific early Friday.

NASA is adamantly opposed to his presence aboard the international space station, arguing that he is a nonprofessional, that he is unfamiliar with the U.S. space station segments and that he does not speak Russian.

The space agency has also warned that Tito would be arriving at one of the busiest times in space station construction and could jeopardize the safety of the crew and the station itself if there were a fire or some other emergency.

Tito does not speak Russian but said that he knows all the necessary emergency and technical phrases and that his Russian crewmates speak excellent English. He insisted he will stay out of the U.S. space segments if NASA wishes. He added that he is well trained for any emergencies and is willing to do whatever routine chores are needed, including cleaning the toilet.

At a time when NASA is facing $4 billion in space station cost overruns, “it just seems there’s a missed opportunity here,” Tito said.

Tito spent the last week in the United States, hoping to take part in NASA training with his two Russian crewmates at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. But NASA stopped him at the gate Monday. He had five bodyguards with him in case of trouble. They were not needed, he said.

Just a week or two earlier, in Russia, two NASA officials met with Tito and tried to persuade him to put off his flight until at least October, so he could undergo six to eight weeks of NASA training on the U.S. space station segments. Tito said he told the men he would not wait until October because he needs to get back to his business and his family.

Tito said he was warned: “Things could get nasty.”

Tito said that the meeting was civil and that he did not take the threat seriously. Nonetheless, he said, “I was concerned enough that I arranged for a fairly serious security effort when I was in Houston.”

Cosmonauts Talgat Musabayev and Yuri Baturin, as well as their backups, refused on Monday to begin training in Houston without Tito. But all four cosmonauts reported for duty the next day, under orders from their bosses in Moscow. Tito stayed behind at his hotel.

NASA spokesman Bob Jacobs said Friday that talks are continuing with the Russians in hopes of resolving the matter. As for any threat, Jacobs acknowledged that NASA officials met recently with Tito in Moscow, but that his understanding was there was no rancor between the two sides.

Russian space officials point out that Tito has completed more than 700 hours of training. “He is not a tourist but practically a professional cosmonaut,” said Pyotr Klimuk, head of the cosmonaut training base.