The Soyuz MS-05 spacecraft is rolled out by train, on 26 July 2017, from the MIK 112 integration facility to the Baikonur Cosmodrome launch pad 1, in Kazakhstan.
ESA astronaut Paolo Nespoli, NASA astronaut Randy Bresnik and Russian commander Sergey Ryazansky are set to leave for the International Space Station from Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on 28 July at 15:41 GMT (17:41 CEST).
Paolo Nespoli is heading to space for a third time. His mission, named the Vita mission, is part of a barter agreement between NASA and Italy’s ASI space agency involving ESA astronauts. Vita stands for Vitality, Innovation, Technology and Ability. In Italian, 'vita' means 'life', reflecting the experiments that Paolo will run and the philosophical notion of living in outer space – one of the most inhospitable places for humans.