Yuri Malenchenko

Education

Graduated from the Kharkov Military Aviation School in 1983, and from the Zhukovsky Air Force Engineering Academy in 1993.

Special honours

Awarded the Hero of the Russian Federation medal, the National Hero of Kazakhstan medal, Military award of excellence, Meritorious Service medals (3), Commendation medal, Achievement medal, Medal '70 years of the Soviet Armed Forces'.

Experience

After graduation from the Military Aviation School, he served as a pilot, senior pilot and multi-ship flight lead from 1983 till 1987 in the Odessa Region. In 1987 he was selected as a cosmonaut, and arrived at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center.

From December 1987 to June 1989 he underwent a course of general space training. After completion of the course, Malenchenko was qualified as a test-cosmonaut. In September 1989 – December 1993 he was taking advanced training courses getting ready for spaceflight.

In January-July 1993 Malenchenko trained as commander of the Mir-14 reserve crew. In July 1993 – January 1994 he completed training as a backup commander of the Mir-15 crew. In February – June 1994 he trained for the Mir-16 mission.

Spaceflight experience

Malenchenko completed his first 126-day spaceflight in 1 July – 4 November 1994 on the Soyuz TM-14 vehicle and the Mir station (Mir-16 mission). The mission included spaceflight of Ulf Merbold, an ESA astronaut as part of the EuroMir program. Malenchenko completed two spacewalks that lasted 11 hours and 7 minutes total. He performed the first manual docking of the Mir station with the Progress M-24 vehicle in the teleoperator mode.

Since October 1998 till September 2000 Malenchenko trained at NASA for a Shuttle spaceflight (2A, later 2A.2B).

Malenchenko served on the crew of STS-106 preparing the International Space Station for the arrival of the first permanent crew. The five astronauts and two cosmonauts delivered more than 6 600 pounds of supplies and installed batteries, power converters, a toilet and a treadmill on the Space Station. Yuri Malenchenko and Ed Lu performed a 6 hour and 14 minute space walk in order to connect power, data and communications cables to the newly arrived Zvezda Service Module and the Space Station.

Since January 2001 he trained as a commander of the ISS 7 prime crew. Malenchenko completed his third spaceflight (with NASA astronaut Ed Lu) as an ISS 7 crew and Soyuz TMA commander. The flight lasted from 26 April till 27 October 2003, with a total duration of 185 days. From November 2003 till September 2005 Malenchenko trained with a group of test-cosmonauts.

Since October 2005 till October 2006 he trained as a flight engineer of the ISS 14 crew and Soyuz commander.

In October 2006 Malenchenko started training as an Expedition 16 flight engineer and Soyuz commander. The Expedition 16 crew launched on 10 October 2007 aboard a Soyuz TMA-11 spacecraft, docking with the orbiting space station on 12 October 2007. Malenchenko will spend a six month tour of duty aboard the International Space Station making this his third long-duration spaceflight.

Source: NASA