The first emirate astronaut will be sent to the ISS on April 5 and will return on April 16, 2019.
Dubai, UAE. The first astronaut from the United Arab Emirates will be sent to the International Space Station on April 5 on the Soyuz MS-12 spacecraft and will return to Earth on April 16, 2019, the Mohammed bin Rashid Cosmonautics Center said.
Either Gazaa Al Mansouri (military pilot) or Sultan Al Niyadi (cybersecurity specialist), who overcame multi-stage selection and began preparations for flying in Star City, will go into space.
The astronaut from the UAE will start with the Russian Oleg Skrypochka and the American Kristina Cook, and return with the astronaut Alexei Ovchinin and the astronaut Nick Hague starting on October 11, 2018. It is worth recalling that 2 candidates were selected from 4,022 applicants.
