Expedition 41/42 Crew Departs for Kazakh Launch Site

Expedition 41/42 Soyuz Commander Alexander Samokutyaev and Flight Engineer Elena Serova of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos), NASA Flight Engineer Barry Wilmore, and their backups, Gennady Padalka and Mikhail Kornienko of Roscosmos and Scott Kelly of NASA, participated in traditional ceremonies at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, Russia, outside Moscow on Sept. 12. Afterward, they departed for the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan to complete their training for the launch of Samokutyaev, Wilmore and Serova to the International Space Station in the Soyuz TMA-14M spacecraft on Sept. 26, Kazakh time. Serova will become only the fourth Russian female cosmonaut to fly in space and was greeted at the farewell ceremony by Valentina Tereshkova, the first woman to fly in space. Kelly and Kornienko are scheduled to launch in March 2015 for a one-year mission on the space station.