MOSCOW. Nov 12 (Interfax-AVN) - The crew of the International Space Station's (ISS) Expedition 10 will redock the Russian Soyuz-TMA-5 spaceship on November 29.
Soyuz, which is now docked with the Pirs docking compartment, will be transferred to the Zarya module, a spokesman for Russian ground control told Interfax on Thursday.
The crewmembers will have to mothball the ISS for several hours, enter Soyuz and dock off from Pirs. They will fly to a safe distance from the station, approach Zarya and dock Soyuz with its lower docking unit.
"After that, they will check the air tightness of the connection which will take 1.5 hours. The check is conducted after each docking," the spokesman said.
The operation is necessary to leave Pirs free for the two spacewalks planned for the current mission. The spokesman said the first spacewalk is scheduled for January 27 and the second for March. The exact date of the second spacewalk will be set at the beginning of 2005.
The spokesman said redocking operations have not been conducted for two years since they have not been needed. "Now the cosmonauts will have to carry out the complex maneuver again. The station has to be mothballed in case the cosmonauts fail to dock the spaceship with the other module or any other emergency," he said.