Williams/Vinogradov Will Head To ISS In March

NASA and its international partners have selected astronaut Jeffrey Williams and Russian cosmonaut Pavel Vinogradov as the next crew for the International Space Station, designated as Expedition 13.

Williams is a US Army colonel, and veteran of one space flight. He flew aboard the Space Shuttle Atlantis as a mission specialist in May 2000, on a 10-day space station assembly mission. During that mission, he performed a spacewalk lasting almost seven hours. He will serve as Expedition 13 flight engineer and NASA science officer.

Williams is a graduate of the US Military Academy at West Point, and has master's degrees from the Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, CA, and the Naval War College. He was selected as an astronaut in 1996.

Vinogradov's space-legs were developed as a veteran of one long-duration spaceflight, when he flew aboard Russia's Mir station as flight engineer for 198 days in 1997. During the mission, he performed five spacewalks. A graduate of Moscow Aviation Institute, he was selected as a cosmonaut in 1992. Vinogradov (above) will command Expedition 13.

Astronaut Mike Fincke and Russian cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin were selected to train as the back-up crew.

Williams (above) and Vinogradov will launch aboard a Russian Soyuz (TMA-8) in March 2006. After a changing of the guard, the current Expedition 12 crew, Commander Bill McArthur and Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev, will return to Earth aboard the same Soyuz capsule.

FMI: www.nasa.gov/station