After a descent from the international space station, the Soyuz TMA-12 capsule carrying a British-born space tourist Richard Garriott and two cosmonauts landed the earth safely at 0337GMT in north-central Kazakhstan.

Richard, acomputer game designer, conducted various scientific experiments during his 10-day stay on the orbiting station, for which he paid an estimated $30 million to the Russian government.

Search and recovery crews extracted Richard Garriott, Sergei Volkov and Oleg Kononenko from the capsule.

Mr. Garriott was greeted by his father, former NASA astronaut Owen Garriott, who flew on the US space station Skylab in 1973.

Mr. Volkov, the son of a cosmonaut, beat Richard as the first to follow a parent into space when he flew up to the space station six months ago.