spacetoday.net: ISS crew repositions Soyuz

Posted: Fri, Nov 18, 2005, 8:15 AM ET (1315 GMT)
Soyuz undocks from ISS during Exp. 12 (NASA)

The two-man crew of the International Space Station briefly left the orbiting outpost early Friday to move their Soyuz spacecraft to a new docking port. William McArthur and Valery Tokarev boarded the Soyuz TMA-7 spacecraft and undocked from the Pirs module of the ISS at 3:46 am EST (0846 GMT). They moved the Soyuz over to a nearby docking port on the Zarya module, docking 19 minutes later. No problems were reported during the brief maneuver. The move was needed to free up the port on the Pirs airlock module for a spacewalk that will be conducted from there next month. However, a Russian official told RIA Novosti that the spacewalk, once scheduled for December but later moved to January or February, may be put off until after the Expedition 12 crew completes their stay on the station in April because of continued delays in the launch of the next shuttle mission, now planned for May.