Indian Gaganyaan Program Selects Candidates for Its First Space Flight

The national Air Force of India begins selection of candidates for the first space flight according to the Gaganyaan program. The country aims at implementing the program by 2022, thus becoming the fourth country that can send its team to space. The country is ready to spend about one and a half billion dollars for the organization and implementation of its first national flight.

The Indian Air Force is going to select 10 astronauts, including women. The piloted Gaganyaan spaceship will be able to place into low earth orbit three astronauts simultaneously and to work in space for up to seven days, Sibnovosti.ru reports.

Earlier it was declared that Russia will help India trainastronauts for the expedition. They will spend not less than two years on pilot training.

"We are working on different training programs. After the contract between Russia and India is fully coordinated, we will present the final version", TASS quotes the Head of the Russian Cosmonaut Training Center Pavel Vlasov.

To recap, Russia and India have signed the memorandum of cooperation on the manned space program.