CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida: A former space shuttle commander whose twin brother is married to former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords will attempt the longest spaceflight ever by an American.
NASA astronaut Scott Kelly and Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko will spend an entire year aboard the International Space Station beginning in 2015.
Both countries’ space agencies announced the names of the two veteran spacefliers on Monday. The extended mission was approved almost two months ago to provide a medical foundation for future missions around the moon, as well as far-flung trips to asteroids and Mars.
Both men already have lived aboard the space station for six months. NASA wanted experienced space station astronauts to streamline the amount of training necessary for a one-year stint. Officials had said the list of candidates was very short. They will begin training next year.
“Their skills and previous experience aboard the space station align with the mission’s requirements,” Bill Gerstenmaier, head of human exploration for NASA, said in a statement. “The one-year increment will expand the bounds of how we live and work in space and will increase our knowledge regarding the effects of microgravity on humans as we prepare for future missions beyond low-Earth orbit.”
Kelly’s identical twin brother, Mark Kelly, retired from the astronaut corps last year and moved to Tucson, Arizona, his wife’s hometown. The former congresswoman was critically wounded in an assassination attempt in January 2011, while Scott Kelly was living aboard the space station.
NASA said neither crew member was available Monday to comment and that news conferences would be held next week to outline the mission.
Astronauts normally spend about four to six months aboard the space station. The longest an American lived there was seven months, several years back.
Russia, though, will continue to hold the world space endurance record.
Four cosmonauts spent at least a year aboard the old Mir space station. A Russian physician, Valery Polyakov, logged nearly 15 continuous months there in the mid-1990s.
Boris Morukov, head of the Moscow-based Institute for Medical and Biological Problems, Russia’s main space medicine research center, told the Interfax news agency that communications and food rations for Kelly and Kornienko may be limited during their yearlong mission to better simulate interplanetary travel.
Kelly and Kornienko will launch aboard a Russian rocket from Kazakhstan. Americans must buy seats on Russian spacecraft now that NASA’s shuttles have retired to museums, until private US companies have vessels capable of carrying human passengers. That’s still four or five years off.
Kelly is a 48-year-old, divorced Navy captain with two daughters. Kornienko, 52, a rocket engineer, is married with a daughter.
“We have chosen the most responsible, skilled and enthusiastic crew members to expand space exploration, and we have full confidence in them,” Russian Space Agency chief Vladimir Popovkin said in the announcement.
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AP writer Vladimir Isachenkov in Moscow contributed to this report.
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Online:
NASA: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html
US twin astronaut, Russian to spend year in orbit
US twin astronaut, Russian to spend year in orbit
Apple to update EU browser options, make more apps deletable
- iPhone maker came under pressure from regulators to make changes after the EU’s sweeping Digital Markets Act took effect on March 7
- Apple users will be able to select a default browser directly from the choice screen after going through a mandatory list of options
STOCKHOLM: Apple will change how users choose browser options in the European Union, add a dedicated section for changing default apps, and make more apps deletable, the company said on Thursday.
The iPhone maker came under pressure from regulators to make changes after the EU’s sweeping Digital Markets Act took effect on March 7, forcing big tech companies to offer mobile users the ability to select from a list of available web browsers on a “choice screen.”
The new rules require mobile software makers to show the choice screen where users can select a browser, search engine and virtual assistant as they set up their phones, which earlier came with preferred options from Apple and Google.
In an update later this year, Apple users will be able to select a default browser directly from the choice screen after going through a mandatory list of options.
A randomly ordered list of 12 browsers per EU country will be shown to the user with short descriptions, and the chosen one will be automatically downloaded, Apple said. The choice screen will also be available on iPads through an update later this year.
Apple released a previous update in response to the new rules in March, but browser companies criticized the design of its choice screen, and the Commission opened an investigation on March 25 saying it suspected that the measures fell short of effective compliance.
The company said it has been in dialogue with the European Commission and believes the new changes will address regulators’ concerns.
It also plans to introduce a dedicated area for default apps where a user will be able to set defaults for messaging, phone calls, spam filters, password managers and keyboards.
Users will also be able to delete certain Apple-made apps such as App Store, Messages, Camera, Photos and Safari. Only Settings and Phone apps would not be deletable.
