Apr 8 2008
From The Space Library
A Russian Soyuz TMA-12 passenger-transport craft launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 12:17 (UT), marking the beginning of the ISS’s Expedition 17 mission. The Soyuz carried Russian cosmonauts, Sergei A. Volkov and Oleg D. Kononenko, and South Korean astronaut So-yeon Yi. Yi, the first South Korean to enter space, would stay on the ISS for only 10 days, conducting experiments. She would then return to Earth with the departing Expedition 16 crew members, aboard a Soyuz TMA-11 that had been docked at the ISS since October 2007. Kononenko was Expedition 17’s Flight Engineer, and Volkov was the mission’s Commander. Volkov was the son of cosmonaut Alexander A. Volkov, making this launch the first occasion of a second-generation cosmonaut or astronaut traveling to space. The third member of the expedition, American astronaut Garrett E. Reisman, was already aboard the ISS. Over the course of six months, the crew of Expedition 17 planned to install the large Japanese Kibo laboratory, supervise the undocking of ESA’s Jules Verne ATV, and complete at least one spacewalk.
Spacewarn Bulletin, no. 654, 1 May 2008, http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/spacewarn/spx654.html (accessed 17 February 2011); Clara Moskowitz, “New Station Crew, Korean Astronaut Rocket Into Space,” Space.com, 8 April 2008, http://www.space.com/5217-station-crew-korean-astronaut-rocket-space.html (accessed 3 March 2011).
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
