* Astronomy

Expedition 52-53 Crew Conducts Traditional Ceremonies in Star City and Moscow, Russia

Spoiler

Expedition 52-53 Soyuz Commander Sergey Ryazanskiy of Roscosmos and Flight Engineers Randy Bresnik of NASA and Paolo Nespoli of the European Space Agency, and their backups, Alexander Misurkin of Roscosmos, Mark Vande Hei of NASA and Norishige Kanai of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency visited the Gagarin Museum at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, Russia July 10 where they viewed historic space artifacts, then visited Red Square in Moscow for traditional ceremonies, including the laying of flowers at the Kremlin Wall where Russian space icons are interred. Ryazanskiy, Bresnik and Nespoli are scheduled to launch on July 28 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan in the Soyuz MS-05 spacecraft for a four and a half month mission on the International Space Station.