BAIKONUR. April 7 (Interfax) - A state commission has approved members of the main crew of the Soyuz MS-27 spaceship to go to the International Space Station (ISS) on April 8 and their backups, Roscosmos said.
The main crew consists of Roscosmos cosmonauts Sergei Ryzhikov and Alexei Zubritsky and NASA astronaut Jonathan Kim. Their backups are cosmonauts Sergei Kud-Sverchkov and Sergei Mikayev and NASA astronaut Christopher Williams.
A Soyuz-2.1a rocket coupled with the Soyuz MS-27 spaceship is due to take off from Area 31 of the Baikonur Cosmodrome at 8:47 a.m. on April 8.
NASA astronaut Kim will be travelling to the ISS under the Russian-U.S. cross flights agreement.
In July 2022, Roscosmos and NASA signed an agreement on cross flights of Russian cosmonauts by U.S. Crew Dragon spaceships and U.S. astronauts by Russian Soyuz-MS spaceships as part of the ISS program.