We left Star City last Thursday in the morning, after a few traditional events that always mark crews’ departures. The community – other astronauts and cosmonauts, representatives of the different space agencies, instructors and many more – gathers around a breakfast table; except that typically nobody eats anything. Instead, several toasts are spoken, mostly around the theme of well wishes for the prime crew and reminders to the backup crew not to relax. Before leaving, we all find some horizontal surface to sit down for a minute or so: not doing so would bring bad luck!
Once outside, Terry, Anton and myself walked behind the prime crew and their families to go and pose for some pictures, after which the prime crew answered some questions for the media. And then, before we knew it, we were on a bus to the Chkalovsky airport, where two Tupolev Tu-134 of the Cosmonaut Training Center were waiting for us.
Don’t think we came to Baikonour alone. The so-called Operational Group flew with us, split in the two airplanes: instructors, drivers, doctors, sports trainers, suit specialists…. all the knowledge and expertise from Star City that we need for the two weeks of quarantine, the fit checks and all the way to launch. Most of these people have been here many times and it’s apparent that they form a close-knit, efficient team. It was also clear right from the plane ride that it would be great fun sharing this experience with them!
I’ve heard and read so much about Baikonour, that finally arriving here was a very intense moment. But things went fast: we stepped out of the airplane and reported to the Energia representatives, who were waiting for us on the apron (Energia is the company that builds the Soyuz). Then, after enjoying the warm welcome of local school children, we jumped on a bus, incidentally the same bus that we’ll drive to the launch pad on. With the prime crew riding in another bus in front of us, we left for our quarantine location. But as we passed by the famous monument representing Baikonour, we just had to jump out and take a picture!
More pictures here:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/astrosamantha/sets/72157644330297400/
(Trad IT) Traduzione in italiano a cura di +AstronautiNEWS qui:
https://www.astronautinews.it/tag/logbook/
(Trad ES) Tradducción en español aquí:
https://www.intervidia.com/category/bitacora/
(Trad FR) Traduction en français par +Anne Cpamoa ici:
https://spacetux.org/cpamoa/category/traductions/logbook-samantha/
19/05/2014