Expedition 44/45 backup crew members Timothy Kopra of NASA (left) and Timothy Peake of the European Space Agency (right).
At the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, Russia, Expedition 44/45 backup crew members Timothy Kopra of NASA (left) and Timothy Peake of the European Space Agency (right) share a light-hearted moment before departing for the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan July 10 for final pre-launch training. Prime crew members Kimiya Yui of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, Kjell Lindgren of NASA and Oleg Kononenko of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) will launch on their Soyuz TMA-17M spacecraft July 23 from Baikonur for a five-month mission on the International Space Station.