RUSSIA SPACE CREW TRAINING (Future space crew trains to land in winter forest)

An international space crew due to go into space next year started on Friday (January 31) their survival training in case of an emergency landing in winter forest. The crew consisted of Russian cosmonauts Gennady Padalka and Mikhail Kornienko, as well as U.S. astronaut Scott Kelly. They donned their winter clothes inside a space landing capsule and upon exit built a tent and started a fire as temperatures in a Russian forest dipped below minus 20 Celsius (minus 3 Fahrenheit). The crew should be able to survive for at least 48 hours in harsh conditions in case of an emergency landings before help arrives. An emergency kit in the landing capsule contains only the bare necessities, such as a torch, a radio and basic medicine, as well as six litres of water for the entire crew. Gennady Padalaka, who went to space four times, said it was not only a survival training, but a bonding exercise too. "Strengths and weaknesses, the reliability of the crew, psychological compatibility - this all is being examined here, at trainings like this when we try to survive in winter, at sea or in desert," Padalka said. This international crew is due to go to the International Space Station (ISS) for a record year-long mission in spring of 2015. As of now, space crews spend no more than half a year at the ISS.