Crew to International Space Station is to pass exams on flight program - 8 October, 2002

October 7-8th, the major crew to the International Space Station will have exams on the flight program and a week's work in the station, said a specialist from the Gagarin Cosmonauts Training Centre, situated in Star City in the Moscow region, to RIA Novosti.

Today the backup crew including Russian cosmonauts Yuri Lonchakov and Alexander Lazutkin has set to these exams," the specialist pointed out. "The cosmonauts have passed an exam in the first centre building at the stimulator of the Soyuz piloted spaceship which is due to start on October 28th from the Baikonur cosmodrome. The crew work was under control when automated docking with the International Space Station failed and the spaceship joined the station in a manual mode. The crew did well during the "test flight" in emergency situation conditions," the centre's representative pointed out.

Lonchakov is to pass an exam to the State Committee comprised of the main crewmembers--Russian cosmonaut Sergei Zaletin and Austrian astronaut Frank de Winne.

"Yuri Lonchakov's "double pressure" with the exams is due to the fact that he has been recommended to the main crew staff to substitute an American space traveller Lance Bass who has quitted the enterprise. The State Committee is to appoint the final main crew staff on October 11th," the spokesman stated.