Energia Rocket and Space Corporation specialists filled Progress mS-05 cargo vehicle with propellant components and pressurized gas at Baikonur launchsite.

Roscosmos specialists started looking for Progress MS-04 cargo vehicle debris that fell in Tuva region. Progress MS-04 cargo vehicle burst on December 1, at the altitude of 190 km above mountain region in Tuva. As TsENKI representative stated less that 10% of the vehicle could have fallen since most parts of it burned in the atmosphere.

Soyuz-U booster with new series cargo vehicle Soyuz MS-04 was rolled out from the integration building and erected on pad №1 (Gagarin launchpad).

NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson, Russian Space Agency Roscosmos cosmonaut Oleg Novitskyi and the European Space Agency’s Thomas Pesquet are traveling to the International Space Station aboard the Soyuz TMA-20M spacecraft.

Baikonur launchsite saw traditional flag-raising ceremony taking place at the pad #17 in front of Cosmonaut hotel.

Today, October 19, 2016, 11.05, Moscow time, Soyuz MS-02 manned spacecraft was successfully launched by Soyuz-FG booster from #31 launchpad of Baikonur launchsite with crew commander Sergey Ryzhikov (Roscosmos) and flight engineers Andrei Borisenko (Roscosmos) and Robert Shane Kimbrough (NASA) onboard.

The specialists have completed all scheduled works to prepare Soyuz MS-02 spacecraft for the launch and future docking with the ISS, - Mission Control Centre specislists reported.

The launch of Soyuz MS-02 spacecraft initially scheduled for September 23 and postponed due to technical reasons was preliminarily scheduled for October 19, - the spokesman reported.

In case specialists manage to eliminate all the failures in Soyuz MS-02 spacecraft and conduct additional testing necessary the launch can possibly take place within the period from October 12 to October 20, if not – it is planned to send Soyuz MS-03 to the ISS early November.

ussia informed NASA colleagues about the new possible date of Soyuz MS-02 launch. It will be November 01, 2016, instead of September 23, 2016.