Training Begins for Next ISS Crew

MOSCOW. Feb 21 (Interfax) — Russian cosmonaut Yury Malenchenko and U.S. astronaut Edward Lu have started training in Russia’s Gagarin Center for Cosmonaut Training.

The two men will take part in a mission to the International Space Station [ISS]. Another Russian cosmonaut, Alexander Kaleri, and U.S. astronaut Michael Foale will make up the alternative crew.

A training center source told Interfax on Friday that the crews have not yet been confirmed officially. Confirmation will be made by the international commission of partner-nations for the ISS within the next two weeks.

Malenchenko, Kaleri and Lu were previously members of the ISS seventh mission, whose departure onboard a U.S. space shuttle was planned for early March. However, plans changed following the loss of space shuttle Columbia on February 1.

On Thursday, Yury Koptev, chief of the Russian Aviation and Space Agency [Rosaviakosmos] said that the next mission will leave for the ISS aboard a Russian Soyuz TMA-2 spacecraft from the Baikonur launch center in early May.

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