Russia to Help Spanish Astronaut Fly Into Space?

Spain is interested in the proposal of Rosoviakosmos (Russian space agency) to service the International Space Station by means of Russian spaceships due to the crash of the Columbia and suspension of space shuttles' flights.

EFE news agency points out that in this case, Spanish astronaut Pedro Duque will still have an opportunity to work on the ISS. He planned to set for the station by a shuttle on April 26th. Spain hopes that these plans can be realised with Russia's assistance, although behind time.

Duque was trained in the Stellar Town near Moscow in 1992-94 and even was a backup, but at that time he did not go to space. After that, he flied Discovery together with American veteran astronaut John Glenn.

The Spanish astronaut highly appraises the quality of Russian Soyuz spaceships and the quality of Russian cosmonauts' training. According to him, cosmonauts receive a more fundamental training which enables them to take independent decisions if need be.