May 8, 2006 Joe Pally Headquarters, Washington (202) 358-7239 Nicole Cloutier-Lemasters Johnson Space Center, Houston (281) 483-5111 MEDIA ADVISORY: M06-083 NEWLY RETURNED SPACE STATION CREW AVAILABLE FOR INTERVIEWS The recently returned 12th crew of the International Space Station, U.S. Commander Bill McArthur and Russian Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev, will be available for satellite interviews from 7 to 9 a.m. EDT Friday, May 12. To participate, media should contact the Johnson newsroom at (281) 483-5111 or Stephanie Stoll at (281) 483-9071 or via pager at (713) 508-0581 by 4 p.m. EDT Thursday. After six months in orbit, McArthur and Tokarev landed in a Soyuz spacecraft in Kazakhstan on April 8. They arrived in the United States last week. During 189 days in space, they conducted two spacewalks, contacted a record number of students via amateur radio and became the first crew to dock a spacecraft to all three Russian station docking ports. For International Space Station information, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/station McArthur, a North Carolina native, is a retired Army colonel who has flown on three shuttle missions in addition to his stay on the space station. He has logged more than 224 days in space. Also a veteran space flier, Tokarev was born in Kap-Yar in Russia's Astrakhan Region. His first flight was aboard the shuttle in 1998, a 10-day mission that delivered four tons of supplies to the station to prepare it for arrival of its first crew, Expedition 1. For more on the Expedition 12 crew, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition12/index.html The interviews and b-roll of Expedition 12 crew training airs live on the NASA TV analog satellite, AMC-6, Transponder 5C at 72 degrees west longitude, vertical polarization. The frequency is 3800 MHz, with audio at 6.8 MHz. The training b-roll airs from 6:30 to 7 a.m. EDT on May 12. For digital downlink information and links to streaming video, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/ntv -end- To subscribe to the list, send a message to: hqnews-subscribe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To remove your address from the list, send a message to: hqnews-unsubscribe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
