BAIKONUR/Kazakhstan/, October 18. /TASS/. The state commission at the Baikonur spaceport in Kazakhstan has approved the crew of the next expedition to the International Space Station (ISS) that is due to be launched aboard Soyuz MS-02 on October 19, the Roscosmos state space corporation said.

"Russian cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Andrey Borisenko, and also US astronaut Robert Kimbrough have been approved as members of the main crew," a representative of the state space corporation said.

The Soyuz-FG carrier rocket with the Soyuz MS-02 spacecraft is due to be launched to the ISS at 11:05am Moscow time on October 19. After reaching the orbit, the spacecraft will be on an automated flight for two days. It will dock the Russian module Poisk at 12:59 pm Moscow time on October 21.