YEKATERINBURG, October 15. /TASS/. A search and rescue group from Russia’s Central Military District is ready to ensure the safe landing of a Soyuz MS-18 descent module with a film crew on board scheduled to touch down on the morning of October 17, Chief of the District’s Search and Rescue Coordination Group Colonel Sergei Batakov announced on Friday.
"The crews of aircraft and helicopters, the ground search taskforce, the flight control group, and personnel have been assigned the task of carrying out search and rescue efforts for the landing of the Soyuz MS-18 descent module, and both aviation and special equipment have been prepared," the colonel said.
"The aircraft, the ground search equipment, the ground-based flight control systems, the pilots and the personnel of military units from the 14th Air Force and Air Defense Army of the Russian Aerospace Force are ready to fulfill search and rescue measures for the landing of the descent capsule of the Soyuz MS-18 manned spacecraft," the officer reported.
Overall, about 200 military staff members, 12 Mi-8MTV5-1 helicopters, three An-12 and An-26 planes and around 20 pieces of special equipment belonging to the Central Military District, including five search and evacuation amphibious vehicles are involved in the operation for the safe landing of the manned Soyuz spacecraft.
The film crew consisting of actress Yulia Peresild and film director Klim Shipenko is shooting the first-ever movie in outer space about a woman doctor who travels to the orbital outpost to save a cosmonaut’s life. Russian cosmonauts Anton Shkaplerov, Oleg Novitsky and Pyotr Dubrov also have parts in the movie. The actress and the film director will spend 12 days in orbit and come back to Earth together with cosmonaut Novitsky aboard the Soyuz MS-18 spacecraft’s descent module on October 17.