UAE astronauts arrive in Russia to be trained for long-term ISS mission

MOSCOW. Oct 26 (Interfax) - Astronauts from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Sultan AlNeyadi and Hazzaa AlMansoori have arrived at Zvyozdny Gorodok (Star City) outside Moscow to be trained for a long-term mission to the International Space Station (ISS), AlNeyadi said on Wednesday.

"In preparation for our mission, [Hazzaa AlMansoori] and I return to Star City where we started our training endeavor four years ago," AlNeyadi said on Twitter.

"Glad to see our Russian colleagues again," he said.

Mohammed bin Rashid Space Center Director General Salem AlMarri has said AlNeyadi has undergone intensive training, including at the Johnson Space Center in the United States. By the time he is supposed to fly into space, his overall training period would have reached five years, he said.

AlNeyadi is to go to the ISS in 2023 on board a SpaceX spacecraft, Crew Dragon 6, along with Roscosmos Cosmonaut Andrei Fedyayev and NASA Astronauts Stephen Bowen and Warren Hoburg.

Hazzaa AlMansoori is the first and currently only UAE astronaut. On October 25, 2019, he flew to the ISS along with Roscosmos Cosmonaut Oleg Skripochka and NASA Astronaut Jessica Meir from the Baikonur Cosmodrome as part of the Soyuz MS-15 mission.

AlMansoori spent eight days on the ISS and returned to Earth on board the Soyuz MS-12 spacecraft on October 3, 2019.