On 14 November 2011, the Russian Soyuz TMA-22 spacecraft launched into space, from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, on a mission to the International Space Station (ISS), the largest artificial satellite of Earth, orbiting at an altitude of about 350 km. Soyuz TMA-22 carries onboard NASA astronaut Dan Burbank and Russian cosmonauts Anton Shkaplerov and Anatoly Ivanishin. Coverage of the Soyuz arrival at the ISS will be broadcasted on NASA Television, on 15 November.
Soyuz TMA-22 is scheduled to dock with the ISS on 15 November 2011. Its three crewmembers will join ISS Expedition 29 crew, consisting of Commander Mike Fossum of NASA and Flight Engineers Satoshi Furukawa (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) and Russian cosmonaut Sergei Volkov. Fossum will hand over command of the ISS to the new crew within a few days.
Fossum, Furukawa and Volkov flew to the ISS in June 2011, and are scheduled to return to Earth in their Soyuz TMA-02M spacecraft, on 22 November. ISS Expedition 30 begins when Expedition 29 crew departs, leaving Burbank in command. A formal ceremony of command change is planned for 20 November, and will be aired on NASA TV.
NASA astronaut Don Pettit, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko and European Space Agency astronaut Andre Kuipers are scheduled to travel to the ISS on 21 December, when they will participate in Expedition 30, as flight engineers.
The six crewmembers will conduct dozens of experiments, during their stay aboard the ISS. They also will welcome a new type of commercial resupply space vehicles from the United States, known as Dragon. Dragon will perform a test flight and rendezvous with the ISS. Another cargo spaceship, known as Cygnus, will soon follow Dragon.
References
NASA
www.nasa.gov/
Wikipedia