NASA astronaut Scott Tingle and JAXA astronaut Norishige Kanai started their preflight trainings in Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Centre in Star City, Moscow region.

Yesterday, on December 2, 2015, Baikonur say traditional flag-raising ceremony taking place at #17 launchpad in front of “Cosmonaut” hotel.

ISS-46/47 mission prime and back-up crews started passing final prelaunch trainings at Baikonur spaceport. The prime crew includes Roscosmos cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko, NASA astronaut Timothy Kopra and ESA astronaut Timothy Peake, the back-up crew comprises Roscosmos cosmonaut Anatoly Ivanishin, JAXA astronaut Takuya Onishi and NASA astronaut Kathleen Rubins.

Today GCTC officially saw off ISS-46/47 prime (Yuri Malenchenko, Roscosmos, Timothy Kopra, NASA, and Timothy Peake, ESA) and back-up (Anatoly Ivanishin, Roscosmos, Takuya Onishi, JAXA, and Kathleen Rubins, NASA) crews to Baikonur where they will pass final preparation trainings before the upcoming spaceflight.

New ISS crew period of work onboard the station was increased from 6 to 7 months due to the flight program adjustment, - crew commander Russian cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko said.

Interdepartmental Commission approved main and back-up crews of new ISS mission. The launch of Soyuz TMA-19M is scheduled for December 15 and will take place from Baikonur spaceport, - GCTC spokesman stated.

On Friday, November 20, GCTC specialists summed up the results of ISS-46/47 main and back-up crews exams.

Roscosmos cosmonaut Anatoly Ivanishin and JAXA astronaut Takuya Onishi passed exam on manual controlled descent. TS-7 specialized simulator on the basis of Tsf-7 centrifuge was designed for practicing manual controlled descent in case automatics failure.

Russian cosmonaut Gennady Padalka who has recently set new world record on total flight duration spending in space 878 days is going to beat his own record and spend in space 1000 days, - GCTC spokesman reports.

Interdepartmental Commission approved main and back-up crews of new ISS mission for the flight, - GCTC spokesman reported.