WIKIARCHIVES.SPACE

At their Cosmonaut Hotel crew quarters in Baikonur, Kazakhstan, the Expedition 46-47 prime and backup crewmembers raise the Russian, American, British and Kazakh flags during a traditional ceremony Dec. 2. From left to right are Yuri Malenchenko and Anatoly Ivanishin of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos), Tim Kopra and Kate Rubins of NASA, Tim Peake of the European Space Agency and Takuya Onishi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). Kopra, Peake and Malenchenko will launch on Dec. 15 on the Soyuz TMA-19M spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome for a six-month mission on the International Space Station.