Russia is set to launch the second in its new line of Soyuz crewed spacecraft to the International Space Station and, at the same time, mark the first flight of its next-generation space vehicle — albeit in miniature.
Soyuz MS-02 is scheduled to launch Wednesday (Oct. 19) at 4:05 a.m. EDT (0805 GMT or 2:05 p.m. local time) from Russia's Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Flying on board the vehicle for their two-day trip to the space station will be Russian cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Andrei Borisenko and NASA astronaut Shane Kimbrough.
Hanging over their heads, suspended by a red, white and blue ribbon, will be a small model of Russia's new piloted transport spaceship, which Roscosmos, the nation's space agency, plans as a replacement for the Soyuz.
Two Russian cosmonauts and a U.S. astronaut are now on their way to the International Space Station, where they will begin the outpost's 50th expedition a week after they arrive.
Cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Andrei Borisenko and astronaut Shane Kimbrough lifted off Wednesday (Oct. 19) on board Russia's Soyuz MS-02 spacecraft on a two-day rendezvous with the station. Their launch at 4:05 a.m. EDT (0805 GMT; 2:05 p.m. local time) came atop a Soyuz FG rocket from Site 31/6 at Russia's Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
Robert Pearlman
Soyuz MS-02 docks to space station
Russia's Soyuz MS-02 spacecraft docked to the Poisk module at the International Space Station Friday (Oct. 21) at 4:52 a.m. CDT (0952 GMT) as the vehicles were 251 miles above the Earth, over southern Russia.
Robert Pearlman
Soyuz MS-02 undocks from space station
After 171 days on board the International Space Station, cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Andrei Borisenko of Roscosmos and astronaut Shane Kimbrough of NASA undocked their Soyuz MS-02 spacecraft from the Poisk module on Monday (April 10) at 2:57 a.m. CDT (0757 GMT), beginning their return to Earth.
The Soyuz will perform a 4-minute, 38-second deorbit burn at 5:28 a.m. CDT (1028 GMT). The crew is scheduled to touch down at 6:21 a.m. CDT (1121 GMT) southeast of Dzhezkazgan, Kazakhstan.
The 50th person to command a crew on the International Space Station is now back on the Earth, a day after handing off control to the first woman to helm the orbiting outpost twice.
NASA astronaut Shane Kimbrough, who led Expedition 50, landed with Sergey Ryzhikov and Andrei Borisenko of the Russian federal space corporation Roscosmos aboard the Soyuz MS-02 spacecraft on Monday (April 10). The three crewmates departed the space station after spending more than 173 days in orbit (171 days on the space station).
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