Expedition 26 Cleared for December 15 Launch

Three astronauts have just been cleared to take off on December 15 to the International Space Station, after the crew managed to pass two important exams in Moscow last week.

With an average score of 4.8 out of 5, the three have now received all necessary clearances and approvals to embark their Russian-built Soyuz space capsule, and head out to low-Earth orbit (LEO), where the rest of the Expedition 26 crew is already waiting for them.

The group will spend about six months in space, before returning to Earth aboard the same space capsule they took off on. They are Paolo Nespoli, Dmitri Kondratyev and Catherine Coleman.

All the assessments and tests they were put through last week, on November 25 and 26, represent the final stage of a two-and-a-half-years program aimed at familiarizing them with all the ins and outs of the Soyuz space capsule and the ISS segments they will be working on.

“The risk of failure is real, so the astronauts spent the last days before the tests reading and going through the procedures,” officials at the European Space Agency (ESA) say in a press release.

“They must know exactly what to do in every situation and which buttons to press when needed,” the statement adds. The crew's performances were assessed by the Interdepartmental Qualification Commission (IQC).

During the tests, they were subjected to a variety of situations that they could potentially encounter during launch, separation, ISS rendezvous and docking. The crew emerged from the tests tired, but successful, with nearly a perfect score.

Today, December 3, the departed for the Baikonur Cosmodrome, in the steppes of Kazakhstan, where their Soyuz TMA-20 spacecraft is waiting for them. Launch is scheduled for December 15 at 20:09 CET (16:09 GMT).

Dmitri Kondratyev, a Russian Federal Space Agency (RosCosmos) cosmonaut, will act as Soyuz Commander, and also as Expedition 27 Commander, once the current one ends. This is his first flight out into space.

Together with fellow cosmonaut Oleg Skripochka, who is already aboard the ISS, the Soyuz commander will conduct two spacewalks outside the ISS during Expedition 26.

Paolo Angelo Nespoli is an astronaut with the European Space Agency, and he will serves as the first flight engineer for the two expeditions. He will play a critical role when Johannes Kepler, the second Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) built by ESA, will visit the ISS.

NASA astronaut Catherine Grace Coleman is already at her third spaceflight, so she can be considered the veteran of the Soyuz crew. She will also be a flight engineer for the two expeditions.