In the course of a space flight the crew may face various off-nominal situations either onboard the spacecraft or the station and has to be able to quickly cope with them.
To prepare the cosmonauts for future actions the specialists create special conditions during the trainings on the Earth to challenge them.
E.g. water survival trainings enable to study cosmonauts’ behavior under sever conditions and train them how to survive in case the descent module lands on water in unexpected point.
ISS-45/46 and ISS-47/48 have already finished their water survival trainings. Both crews are going to fly to the ISS in 2015-2016.
The crew of Sergey Volkov including also Andreas Mogensen and Thomas Pesquet was the first to start training. ISS-47/48 crew comprising Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexey Ovchinin and Oleg Skripochka and NASA astronaut Geoffrey Williams.
The program of water survival trainings includes 14-hours theoretical course and practical trainings itself^ the long and the short one. The tasks of the long one to practice how to change Sokol spacesuit for flight suits (PK-14), heat protecting suit (TZK-14) and Forel waterproof suit inside the descent module. After that cosmonauts leave the descent module taking survival kit with them, gather in a group on the water surface and report to the search and rescue team on the readiness fir evacuation.
According to the “short” training program after the landing the crew detects the leak in the descent module and urgently escapes it in the spacesuits taking survival kits. Then they gather, practice evacuation and cooperation with the search and rescue teams.
Both ISS-45/45 and ISS-47/48 crews accomplished the training program in conformity with the time schedule. GCTC and other space specialists including instructors, divers, doctors, psychologists and 179 Ministry of Emergency Situations centre took part in the trainings.
ISS-46/47 astronauts Timothy Kopra (NASA), Timothy Peake (ESA) and ISS-48/49 crew made up of Anatply Ivanishin (Roscosmos), Takui Onishi (JAXA) and Kathleen Rubens (NASA) will be the next to pass these trainings. ISS-48/49 mission crew will start it on July 2, mass media representatives are allowed to watch the trainings.
