Only Female Cosmonaut in Russia’s Team Set to Go to ISS Next Year, Source Says

MOSCOW (Sputnik) – Russia’s only current female cosmonaut Anna Kikina will head to the International Space Station (ISS) in 2022, a space industry source told Sputnik.

“General Director of [Russia’s space agency] Roscosmos Dmitry Rogozin has ordered the cosmonaut training center to include Anna Kikina in one of the upcoming Soyuz crews set to fly to the ISS in 2022. A decision will be made soon on whether she will be included in a spring or fall crew of next year,” the source said.

In March, Kikina told Sputnik that she was waiting to be appointed to a specific ISS crew and was undergoing preliminary training. In June of last year, Roscosmos said that Kikina was going to head to the ISS as part of a Russian crew within two years.

The Soyuz MS-18 spacecraft carrying the crew formed of Mark Vande Hei of NASA and cosmonauts Oleg Novitskiy and Pyotr Dubrov of Roscosmos blasts off to the International Space Station (ISS) from the launchpad at the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan April 9, 2021.

Kikina has been the only Russian female cosmonaut since September 2016. In November 2017, she took part in the international SIRIUS (Scientific International Research in Unique Terrestrial Station) project that studies the effects of isolation, simulating Moon missions.

Sourse: sputniknews.com