posted 11-21-2014 08:59 AM               

Soyuz TMA-15M poised for launch

Soyuz TMA-15M commander Anton Shkaplerov, together with flight engineers Terry Virts and Samantha Cristoforetti are set to launch to the International Space Station Sunday (Nov. 23) at 3:01 p.m. CST (2101 GMT; 3:01 a.m. local Nov. 24), from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

Credit: NASA/Victor Zelentsov

They will dock their Soyuz to the station's Rassvet module at 8:53 p.m. CST (0253 GMT) following a four-orbit rendezvous.

About two hours later, the hatches between Soyuz TMA-15M and the station will open and Shkaplerov, Virts and Cristoforetti will be greeted by ISS Expedition 42 commander Butch Wilmore of NASA and flight engineers Alexander Samokutyaev and Elena Serova of Roscosmos, who have been on board the orbiting laboratory since late September.

Shkaplerov, Virts and Cristoforetti will remain on the space station through mid-May. Samokutyayev, Serova and Wilmore will return to Earth in early March, leaving Virts as Expedition 43 commander.

On Thursday (Nov. 20), the Soyuz-FG rocket topped with the Soyuz TMA-15M spacecraft was rolled out to the launch pad by train and erected into position.

posted 11-21-2014 09:10 AM               

Disney's 'Frozen' snowman to 'let it go' as zero-g doll on space station ship

Do you want to launch a snowman?

That perhaps is the question — and paraphrased song line from the Disney film "Frozen" — that Anton Shkaplerov's daughter may have asked her cosmonaut father.

For when Shkaplerov and his crewmates, NASA astronaut Terry Virts and European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti, lift off for the International Space Station on Sunday afternoon (Nov. 23), they will have with them a small plush doll of the animated character "Olaf."

"It is going to be the snowman from 'Frozen,'" Shkaplerov told reporters at a pre-flight press conference in Star City, Russia. "My youngest daughter is eight years old and she selected that as a talisman."

posted 11-23-2014 03:13 PM               

Soyuz TMA-15M launches international air force crew to space station

Following a flight path symbolized on the patch sewn on their spacesuits, three new crew members for the International Space Station lifted off Sunday (Nov. 23) for a five-and-a-half-month mission aboard the orbiting outpost.

Roscosmos cosmonaut Anton Shkaplerov, NASA's Terry Virts and Samantha Cristoforetti with the European Space Agency (ESA) launched aboard Russia's Soyuz TMA-15M from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The multi-national crew took flight at 4:01 p.m. EST (2101 GMT or 3:01 a.m. local Kazakh time, Nov. 24) on a six-hour, four-orbit rendezvous with the space station.

Reaching space nine minutes after their Soyuz-FG rocket blasted off the Earth, a small doll of the Disney "Frozen" snowman Olaf began to float inside the capsule, signaling the crew safely made it to orbit.

Set to arrive at the space station on Sunday at 9:50 p.m. EST (0250 GMT), Shkaplerov, Virts, and Cristoforetti will join the Expedition 42 crew commanded by Barry "Butch" Wilmore of NASA with Alexander Samokutyaev and Elena Serova of Roscosmos, who have been aboard the station since late September.

posted 11-23-2014 09:08 PM               

Soyuz TMA-15M docks to space station

The Soyuz TMA-15M carrying Anton Shkaplerov of Roscosmos, Terry Virts of NASA and Samantha Cristoforetti with the European Space Agency docked to the International Space Station's Rassvet module on Sunday (Nov. 23) at 8:48 p.m. CST (0248 GMT, Nov. 24).

The two craft were orbiting above the Pacific Ocean, approaching the coast of Ecuador, when the autonomous docking took place.

posted 06-11-2015 08:52 AM               

Soyuz TMA-15M returns trio to Earth after nearly 200 days on space station

Three space station crew members have returned home to the Earth after spending nearly 200 days off the planet.

NASA astronaut Terry Virts, cosmonaut Anton Shkaplerov of Russia's federal space agency Roscosmos, and Italian astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti with the European Space Agency (ESA) landed on board Russia's Soyuz TMA-15M spacecraft in Kazakhstan on Thursday (June 11).

Descending under a parachute to a thruster-assisted soft touchdown at 9:43 a.m. EDT (1343 GMT; 7:43 p.m. local time), the trio's homecoming occurred about a month later than had been planned as Roscosmos worked to recover from the loss of an unmanned cargo vehicle in late April.

"We got to spend 200 days in space together, a few bonus days, but you just couldn't ask for a better group of people to spend this time in space with," Virts said before he and his crewmates left for Earth.

See here to discuss the Soyuz TMA-15M mission to the space station.