Expedition 18 Crew To Launch from Baikonur

With Fincke, an Air Force colonel, and Lonchakov, a colonel in the Russian Air Force, will be spaceflight participant Richard Garriott, flying under contract with the Russian Federal Space Agency.

Garriott will return to Earth with Expedition 17 crew members, Commander Sergei Volkov and Flight Engineer Oleg Kononenko, in their Soyuz TMA-12 on Oct. 23. Expedition 17 launched to the station April 8.

Expedition 18 crew members will be welcomed by the Expedition 17 crew, including astronaut Gregory E. Chamitoff, after their docking to the orbiting laboratory, scheduled for Tuesday. Chamitoff launched to the station on the STS-124 mission of Discovery May 31. He joined Expedition 17 in progress and will provide Expedition 18 with an experienced flight engineer for the first part of its increment.

Fincke, 41, is making his second long-duration flight on the station. He is a graduate of Massachusetts Institute of Technology and holds master's degrees from Stanford University and the University of Houston, Clear Lake.

He served as an Air Force flight test engineer. He was selected by NASA in 1996. He was commander of the second NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations (NEEMO 2), working seven days on the seafloor off Florida in May 2002. He served as a flight engineer on station Expedition 9 from April to October 2004.

Lonchakov, 43, is a graduate of the Orenburg Air Force Pilot School and the Zhukovski Air Force Academy. He is a class 1 air force pilot. He has more than 1,400 hours of flight time. He also is a paratroop training instructor with 526 jumps.

He was selected as a test cosmonaut candidate in late 1997. He has flown two previous space missions, STS-100 to the station in April 2001 and a Soyuz delivery flight to the station in October and November 2002.

Astronaut Sandra H. Magnus is scheduled to fly to the station on STS-126 to replace Chamitoff as a flight engineer on E18. Magnus, 43, will be replaced near the end of Expedition 18 by Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata, who will launch on Discovery on the STS-119 mission. Magnus holds bachelor's and master's degrees in physics from the University of Missouri-Rolla and a Ph.D. from Georgia Institute of Technology.

She was selected as an astronaut in 1996. Magnus will be making her second spaceflight. She flew as a mission specialist on STS-112 in October 2002.

Provided by NASA

Expedition 18 Takes Command on Space Station
Expedition 18 Commander Mike Fincke, along with flight engineers Yury Lonchakov and Greg Chamitoff, officially took charge of the International Space Station Wednesday. The Change of Command Ceremony took place just before 2 p.m. EDT with Expedition 17 handing over the controls and wrapping up its stay at the International Space Station.
Russian spacecraft docks with space station
(PhysOrg.com) -- Commander Edward Michael "Mike" Fincke and Flight Engineer Yury Valentinovich Lonchakov of the 18th International Space Station crew docked their Soyuz TMA-13 to the Earth-facing port of the Zarya module at 4:26 a.m. EDT Tuesday.
New Crew Blasts Off for International Space Station
(PhysOrg.com) -- A new crew that will live and work aboard the International Space Station rocketed into orbit early Sunday aboard a Soyuz spacecraft. U.S. astronaut E. Michael Fincke, Russian cosmonaut Yury Lonchakov and Richard Garriott, a U.S. computer game developer, lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 2:01 a.m. CDT.
Station Crew Relaxes Before Second Spacewalk
Soaring high above the Earth, the Expedition 17 crew members aboard the International Space Station spent some time Monday relaxing before their second spacewalk, which is slated for about 1:10 p.m. EDT Tuesday. The crew also reviewed the spacewalk timeline and closed hatches on the station in preparation for the excursion.
Station Crew Prepares for Thursday Spacewalk
The Expedition 17 crew of the International Space Station worked Tuesday towards completing preparations for a pair of spacewalks. They donned their spacesuits for a dry run and inspected hatch seals.
Shuttle Discovery Glides Home After Successful Mission
With Commander Mark Kelly and Pilot Ken Ham at the controls, space shuttle Discovery descended to a smooth landing at Kennedy Space Center, Fla. The STS-124 crew concluded their successful assembly mission to the International Space Station when the shuttle landed at 11:15 a.m. EDT.
Astronauts Check Out Japanese Robotic Arm
With the third and final spacewalk completed Sunday, the Expedition 17 and STS-124 crews are heading into the home stretch of their joint mission.
Discovery to Dock with Station Today
Space shuttle Discovery is scheduled to dock with the International Space Station at 1:54 p.m. EDT.

Expedition 18 Crew To Launch from Baikonur

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