Yury Lonchakov

Yury Valentinovich Lonchakov (Юрий Валентинович Лончаков; born 4 March 1965) is a Russian former cosmonaut and a veteran of three space missions.

He has spent 200 days in space and has conducted two spacewalks.

Lonchakov was born on 4 March 1965, in Balkhash, Dzhezkazkansk Region, Kazakhstan.

He considers Aktyubinsk as his native city since he had spent his childhood and youth there.

Lonchokov's parents, Lonchakov Valentin Gavrilovich and Galina Vasilyevna were geologists.

He is married to Lonchakova (Dolmatova) Tatyana Alexeevna.

Following graduation from high school in 1982, Lonchakov entered the Orenburg Air Force Pilot School, graduating with honors in 1986 as pilot-engineer.

They have one son, Kirill, born in 1990.

His hobbies include books, tourism, auto-tourism, downhill skiing, sport games.

In 1995, Lonchakov entered the Zhukovski Air Force Academy from which he graduated with honors in 1998 as pilot-engineer-researcher.

Lonchakov was awarded the Hero of the Russian Federation medal and the honorary title Pilot-Cosmonaut of the Russian Federation.

He was decorated with the Order For Merit to the Fatherland IV class, the Medal "For Merit in Space Exploration", and the NASA Space Flight Medal.

Lonchokov is a National Prize winner for the Glory of Fatherland in nomination Russia Glory, instituted by the International Academy of Social Sciences and International Academy of Patronage.

He is an "Honoured Man of the Aktubinsk region".

After graduation from pilot school, Lonchakov served as a second crew commander, crew commander, squadron senior pilot, and aviation brigade commander in the Russian Navy.

Lonchakov has logged over 1400 hours of flight time, is a Class 1 Air Force pilot, and a paratroop training instructor with 526 jumps.

Lonchakov was selected as a test-cosmonaut candidate of the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center Cosmonaut Office in December 1997.

Space Shuttle Endeavour lifted off from the Kennedy Space Center at 18:40:42 UTC on 19 April 2001.

Lonchakov served as a mission specialist.

After nearly two days of flight, Endeavour docked with the ISS on 21 April 2001 at 13:59 UTC.

After 8 days of docked operations, the shuttle undocked from the ISS at 17:34 UTC on 19 April.

Landing was originally planned at KSC however continuing cloud cover, rain showers and gusty winds forced Endeavour to land at Edwards Air Force Base in California.

The mission duration of STS-100 was 11 days, 21 hours, 31 minutes, 14 seconds.

On 25 March 2002, Lonchakov passed training for a spaceflight as the backup crew commander of the Soyuz-TM, Soyuz-TMA spacecraft, 4th visiting crew under the ISS program.

On 1 October 2002, he was selected for the prime crew as flight engineer-2 and remained the backup crew commander.

Lonchakov returned to the ISS in October 2002 as a crewmember of the Soyuz taxi flight Soyuz TMA-1.

The Soyuz spacecraft carrying commander Lonchakov, flight engineer cosmonaut Sergei Zalyotin and ESA astronaut Frank De Winne lifted off from the Baikonour Cosmodrome on 30 October 2002, at 03:11 UTC.

Thick fog on the ground obscured the launch from the cameras, which showed only a silhouette of the rocket and the flame exhaust.

The successful docking between the Soyuz TMA-1 and the ISS did take place at 05:01 UTC on 1 November 2002.

After spending 10 days, 20 hours and 53 minutes in space Lonchakov returned to Earth on Soyuz TM-34.

The Soyuz TM-34 spacecraft, undocked from the nadir port of the Zarya module of the ISS on 9 November at 20:44 GMT and landed 100 km north east of Arkalyk on 10 November 2002 at 00:04 UTC.

Soyuz TM-34 was the last of the Soyuz-TM spacecraft and was replaced by the Soyuz-TMA.

Lonchakov was originally selected to be a flight engineer on Expedition 19, but was transferred to the Expedition 18 crew as a flight engineer and Soyuz commander, after Salizhan Sharipov was removed from the crew.

In July 2004 he took part in the training for survival in extreme situations at the Baikonur Cosmodrome.

Lonchakov's first spaceflight was the Space Shuttle mission STS-100 that installed the International Space Station's robotic arm, Canadarm2.

Other major objectives for mission were to berth the Raffaello logistics module to the station, activate it, transfer cargo between Raffaello and the station, and reberth Raffaello in the shuttle's payload bay.

The Soyuz TMA-13 spacecraft with Lonchakov, Expedition 18 commander Michael Fincke and space tourist Richard Garriott launched on 12 October 2008 at 7:01 UTC.

Lonchakov served as the Soyuz commander.

After a two-day autonomous flight, Soyuz TMA-13 successfully docked to the Earth-facing docking port of the Zarya module of the ISS on 14 October at 08:26 GMT, seven minutes ahead of schedule.

From 2014 to 2017, Lonchakov served as head of the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center.