Aleksei Ovchinin
Russian Air Force major and cosmonaut, selected in 2006. Ovchinin's first spaceflight has taken place on Soyuz TMA-20M which launched on March 18, 2016 21:26 UTC as part of Expedition 47/Expedition 48. Ovchinin flew as the commander of the ...
Timothy Peake
He completed a degree in flight dynamics and qualified as a Full Experimental Test Pilot at the UK’s Empire Test Pilots' School. He is was officer serving with Her Majesty’s Forces as an Experimental Test Pilot (retired in 2009). He is an avid ...
Aydyn Aimbetov
Colonel Aidyn Akanovich Aimbetov (Айдын Аимбетов, born July 27, 1972 in the Kolkhoz "Zarya Kommunisma", Kazakhstan) is a Kazakh cosmonaut. He is a member of the first, and as of 2015, only Kazakh cosmonaut class, and the first of the class ...
Andreas Mogensen
Born in Copenhagen, Denmark on 2 November 1976, Andreas enjoys rugby, basketball, and squash. He is also active in several adventure sports, including scuba diving, skydiving, kite surfing, kayaking and mountaineering. Other interests include ...
Kimiya Yui
Yui, from Nagano Prefecture, enrolled in the Japan Air Self-Defense Force after he graduated from the National Defense Academy of Japan in 1992. He has piloted a F-15 Eagle fighter (test pilot), and worked in the Air Staff Office's Defense ...
Kjell Lindgren
Dr. Kjell Norwood Lindgren (born January 23, 1973) is a current NASA astronaut. Lindgren was selected in June 2009 as a member of the NASA Astronaut Group 20. He launched to the International Space Station (ISS) as part of Expedition 44/45 on ...
Samantha Cristoforetti
Samantha Cristoforetti (born 26 April 1977 in Milan) is an Italian European Space Agency astronaut, Italian Air Force pilot and engineer. She holds the record for the longest uninterrupted spaceflight of a European astronaut (199 days, 16 hours), ...
Yelena Serova
PERSONAL DATA: Born April 22, 1976, in Vozdvizhenka, Ussurijsk Region of Primorsky Area, Russia. EDUCATION: In March 2001 graduated from aerospace department of the Moscow Aviation Institute as a test engineer. In 2003 graduated from the ...
Alexander Gerst
Alexander Gerst is a German European Space Agency astronaut and geophysicist, who was selected in 2009 to take part in space training. He was part of the International Space Station Expedition 40 and 41 from May to November 2014. Gerst returned ...
Gregory Wiseman
G. REID WISEMAN (COMMANDER, U.S. NAVY)‧NASA ASTRONAUT‧‧Pronunciation: REED WISE-man‧‧PERSONAL DATA: Born in 1975, Wiseman’s hometown is Baltimore, Maryland. Married to the former Carroll Taylor of Virginia Beach, Virginia. They have two ...
Oleg Artemyev
Oleg Germanovich Artemyev (Russian: Олег Германович Артемьев) is a Russian Cosmonaut for the Russian Federal Space Agency. He was selected as part of the RKKE-15 Cosmonaut group in 2003. He was a Flight engineer of Expedition 39 and 40 to the ...
Michael Hopkins
PERSONAL DATA: Born in Lebanon, Missouri, he grew up on a farm outside Richland, Missouri. Married to the former Julie Stutz of Peoria, Illinois. They have two sons. Recreational interests include backpacking, camping, snow skiing, weight ...
Zhang Xiaoguang
He was born in May 1966 in Jinzhou, to a family of Manchu ethnicity and was a squadron commander in the People’s Liberation Army Air Force when he was selected to be an astronaut in 1998. He had accumulated 1000 flight-hours as of 2004. He was ...
Wang Yaping
Colonel Wang Yaping is a Chinese military pilot and astronaut. Wang was the second female astronaut to be named by the CNSA, and the second Chinese woman in space. She was a candidate for the space mission Shenzhou 9 in 2012. However, Liu Yang ...
Luca Parmitano
Luca Parmitano (born 27 September 1976 in Paternò, Sicily) is an Italian engineer and astronaut in the European Astronaut Corps for the European Space Agency (ESA). The astronauts work on missions at the International Space Station. He was ...
Aleksandr Misurkin
Soyuz TMA-M flight engineer ISS flight engineer Roskosmos test-cosmonaut (Russia) Lieutenant-colonel of the Russian Armed Forces, retired DATE AND PLACE OF BIRTH: Born 23 September 1977 in Yershichi, Smolensk Region, Russia. FAMILY STATUS: ...
Yevgeni Tarelkin
Yeysk Air Force School, 1996. Gagarin Air Force Academy, 1998. Captain in the Russian Air Force, experience as a senior testing engineer, flight experience with L-39 and L -29 trainer aircraft, and had made over 500 parachute jumps. From 2000, ...
Oleg Novitskiy
PERSONAL DATA: Born October 12, 1971, in Cherven, Minsk Region, Belorussia. Married to Yulia Vladislavovna Novitskaya (nee Andreeva). They have one daughter, Yana, born in 1996. His mother, Valentina Eduardovna Novitskaya, resides in Cherven, ...
Liu Yang
Liu Yang (born October 6, 1978) is a Chinese pilot and astronaut who served as a crew member on the space mission Shenzhou 9. On June 16, 2012, Liu became the first Chinese woman in space.
What is the difference between a cosmonaut and an astronaut?
Cosmonaut and astronaut are synonyms, that is, theoretically we can use them interchangeably, but traditionally we call people launched into space by the Americans astronauts and by the Russians cosmonauts, regardless of what nationalities they were. That is, Americans, Canadians, Japanese, Italians, French and Germans flying with Americans are astronauts. In contrast, General Hermaszewski, the only (so far) Pole in Space, is called a cosmonaut because he flew as part of the Soviet space program.
