Sun, Apr 08, 2007
Scheduled For Monday Docking With ISS
Two cosmonauts and a 'tourinaut' are well on their way to the
International Space Station. NASA reports Commander Fyodor
Yurchikhin and cosmonaut Oleg Kotov of the 15th International Space
Station crew launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at
1331 EDT Saturday, to begin a six-month stay aboard.
Less than 10 minutes after launch their Soyuz TMA-10 capsule
reached orbit, and its antennas and solar arrays were deployed.
Indications so far point to a flawless launch.
With Yurchikhin and Kotov is Spaceflight Participant Charles
Simonyi, an American flying under contract with the Russian Federal
Space Agency. He will return to Earth with Expedition 14, Commander
Michael Lopez-Alegria and Flight Engineer Mikhail Tyurin, on April
20. Expedition 14 launched to the station last September 18.
As Aero-News reported,
Expedition 15's spacecraft is scheduled to dock at the station
Monday afternoon.
They will be welcomed by the Expedition 14 crew, including
astronaut Sunita Williams, who will become their third Expedition
15 crew member.
Yurchikhin, 48, is making his second flight into space. He was a
member of the STS-112 crew which launched to the station aboard
Atlantis on October 7, 2002, with the Starboard 1 Truss. He holds a
Ph.D. in economics and was named a cosmonaut-candidate in 1997.
Kotov, 41, is making his first spaceflight. He graduated from
the Moscow Medical Academy in 1988, and was named a
cosmonaut-candidate in 1996.
(Photo courtesy of NASA TV)
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