INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION STATUS REPORT: SS07-19

April 9, 2007

John Yembrick
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-0602

John Ira Petty
Johnson Space Center, Houston
281-483-4934

STATUS REPORT: SS07-19

INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION STATUS REPORT: SS07-19

HOUSTON - Two Expedition 15 cosmonauts and a spaceflight participant
aboard a Soyuz spacecraft docked with the Earth-facing port on the
International Space Station’s Zarya module at 2:10 p.m. CDT Monday.

After the hatch opens, which is scheduled for a little before 4 p.m.,
Expedition 15 Commander Fyodor Yurchikhin, Flight Engineer Oleg
Kotov, and Spaceflight Participant Charles Simonyi, a U.S.
businessman, will be greeted by the station’s current crew,
Expedition 14 Commander Michael Lopez-Alegria and flight engineers
Mikhail Tyurin and Suni Williams.

Williams, who has served as an Expedition 14 crew member since
December, will remain on the station providing Expedition 15 with an
experienced flight engineer for the early part of its mission. She is
scheduled to return home aboard space shuttle Endeavour this summer.

Yurchikhin is making his second flight into space. He was crew member
on space shuttle Atlantis’ STS-112 mission to the station in October
2002. He holds a Ph.D. in economics and was named a
cosmonaut-candidate in 1997. Kotov is making his first spaceflight.
He graduated from the Moscow Medical Academy in 1988, and was named a
cosmonaut-candidate in 1996.

Astronaut Clay Anderson is scheduled to replace Williams during
Expedition 15. Two Expedition 16 crew members are expected to arrive
next fall to replace Yurchikhin and Kotov.

Simonyi, flying under contract with the Russian Federal Space Agency,
will return to Earth on April 20 with Lopez-Alegria and Tyurin, who
have been aboard the station since September 2006.

Information on the crew’s activities aboard the space station, future
launch dates, and station sighting opportunities from anywhere on the
Earth, is available at:

http://www.nasa.gov/station

-end-