March 3, 2016

On March 3, 2016, GCTC officially  saw off the members of prime and back-up ISS-47/48 mission crews to Baikonur. The prime crew comprises Roscosmos cosmonauts Alexei Ovchinin and Oleg Skripochka and NASA astronaut Jeffrey Williams. Back-up crew members are Sergey Ryzhikov (Roscosmos), Andrei Borisenko (Roscosmos) and Robert Kimbrough (NASA). According to tradition after breakfast with GCTC specialists and authorities, ISS program representatives and family members the crews visited Lenin monument is Star City.

Answering journalists’ questions about working schedule, scientific experiments planned and preslifght preparations at Baikonur crew commander Alexei Ovchinin said: “We’ll keep the ISS in order, accomplish various maintenance works, and conduct experiments both in the framework of Russian and NASA scientific programs”.

The cosmonaut also pointed out that at Baikonur they will go on the trainings they have already had in GCTC. “We will practice manual docking with the station, manual controlled descent and continue medical trainings to prepare our bodies for spaceflight factors”.

“I feel very excited, – said A. Ovchinin. – For me it was quite a long way. We have a cool crew: Oleg (Skripochka) has already been to space, for Jeffrey (Williams) it will be the fourth flight. I am sure they’ll help me if any problem arises. We are ready for the flight and fill complete all the tasks set”.

After that the crews went to Chkalovsky airfield and left for Baikonur onboard two special charters.

More from this category:
April 23, 2014

Works in the framework of Soyuz-2/Meteor-M prelaunch preparations are under way at Baikonur spaceport. Space device successfully passed all leak checks and was transported from…

full story
February 5, 2014

Russian 2014 space program implementation starts on February 5, 20014 with Progress M-22M cargo vehicle launch. The vehicle will deliver more than 2,5 tons of…

full story
August 28, 2020

The first ever crew of the International Space Station, consisting only of Russian cosmonauts, can fly on the Soyuz MS-18 spacecraft in the spring of…

full story
September 6, 2019

At the Baikonur Cosmodrome is undergoing a planned preparations for the launch of the “Eutelsat-5WB” and “MEV-1” satellites by the “Proton-M” heavy carrier rocket. The…

full story
June 25, 2014

Angara-1.2PP booster will be rolled-out to the launchpad of Plesetsk spaceport (Arkhangelsk region) today, on June 25.  The decision was taken by State Commission meeting…

full story
September 17, 2018

On September 17, 1857, in the village of Izhevsk Ryazan region was born an outstanding Russian scientist, researcher and inventor Konstantin  Tsiolkovsky. For more than…

full story
September 15, 2015

On September 14, 22.00, Moscow time, Roscosmos, Khrunichev Centre and other Russian space industries launching crews successfully launched Proton-M booster with DM-03 upper stage and…

full story
July 2, 2019

Preparations for the launch of the “Progress MS-12” cargo spaceship are continuing at the Baikonur cosmodrome. On July 1, 2019, RSC “Energia” and Yuzhny Space…

full story