Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa (left) and his assistant Yozo Hirano react during pre-launch preparations at the Baikonur cosmodrome on December 8, 2021. The two, led by Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexander Misurkin, will blast off to the International Space Station onboard the Soyuz MS-20 spacecraft at 7:38 GMT. Photo: VCG

A Japanese billionaire arrived at the International Space Station (ISS) on Wednesday, marking Russia's return to space tourism after a decade-long pause that saw the rise of competition from the US.  

Online fashion tycoon Yusaku Maezawa and his assistant Yozo Hirano blasted off from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan earlier on Wednesday.

They docked with the Poisk module of the Russian segment of the ISS at 1340 GMT, the Russian space agency said. 

A Roscosmos livefeed showed the hatch of the Soyuz MS-20 capsule open at 1611 GMT, showing Russian cosmonaut Alexander Misurkin entering the ISS, followed by Maezawa and Hirano. 

Their journey aboard the three-person Soyuz spacecraft piloted by Misurkin took just over six hours, capping a banner year that many have seen as a turning point for private space travel.

As the hatches opened, the trio floated into the orbital station where they were greeted by Russian cosmonauts Anton Shkaplerov and Petr Dubrov. 

The station is currently home to an international crew of seven people.

Billionaires Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson all made breakthrough commercial tourism flights in 2021, bursting into a market Russia is keen to defend.

A crowd at the launch site braved freezing temperatures and cheered as the rocket blasted off into the gray sky, leaving a trail of orange flames before disappearing in the clouds.

"This has been a long process. It's so moving. I was about to cry," said Ryo Okubo, a lawyer for Maezawa's space projects.

"I'm really excited but he's also my friend so I'm worried about him," a longtime friend of the billionaire, 44-year-old Hiroyuki Sugimoto, told AFP.

The trio will spend 12 days on the station where the Japanese tourists will document their daily life aboard the ISS for Maezawa's popular YouTube channel.

The 46-year-old billionaire has set out 100 tasks to complete onboard, including hosting a badminton tournament.

Maezawa also plans to take eight people with him on a 2023 mission around the moon operated by Musk's SpaceX.

Russia has a history of shepherding self-funded tourists to space.

In partnership with US-based company Space Adventures, Roscosmos previously took seven tourists to the ISS since 2001 - one of them twice.

The last was Canada's Cirque du Soleil co-founder Guy Laliberte in 2009, who was dubbed the first clown in space.

AFP