Simonyi returns with gifts from space

How long has it been since a frontier explorer came to Seattle bearing gifts for the natives?

It happened again Wednesday when software pioneer turned space tourist Charles Simonyi returned to Seattle after rehabilitating in Russia and France from his outer-space adventure in April.

At a ceremony at the Museum of Flight, Simonyi arrived with a plastic shopping bag bearing artifacts, which he presented to museum director and astronaut Bonnie Dunbar: a glove from his spacesuit and a drogue parachute used on the Soyuz TMA-9 spacecraft he flew to and from the international space station.

The chute is the first of three that deploy and eventually slow the descent to 25 miles per hour before it lands back on Earth.

"It's quite a hit, but it's survivable," he said.

Simonyi, whose early research was the foundation of Microsoft Word, paid $25 million to become the fifth participant in space tours organized by a Virginia company, Space Adventures.

He also brought back stories of his trip, during which he lost 10 pounds and stayed up at night to take in as much of the experience as possible.

Speaking to Cub Scouts who did projects organized around the trip, and to Redmond High School students he spoke to via radio from space, Simonyi shared highlights.

He described his reunion with Pavel Popovich, a cosmonaut he met after winning a science contest as a teenager in Hungary.

Popovich gave him a postcard after the contest, which Simonyi has kept and took to the space station. Afterward he gave a high-resolution copy to Popovich, now Russia's most senior cosmonaut.

"He was so nice to me," Simonyi said. "He kissed me on the cheek, as is Russian custom, and he called me Charlie."

Brier Dudley: 206-515-5687 or bdudley@seattletimes.com