Valeri Ivanovich Tokarev
Valeri Ivanovich Tokarev is a retired Russian Air Force colonel, test pilot, Buran-era cosmonaut, and two-time space traveler whose career moved from Soviet reusable-spacecraft planning into International operations. He flew once on the Space Shuttle and once on Soyuz, giving him a rare bridge between the early ISS assembly era and long-duration station crews.
- Born
- October 29, 1952
- Died
- N/A
- Birthplace
- Kapustin Yar, Astrakhan Oblast,Soviet Union
Flights
2
Spacewalks
2
EVA time
11 hours, 5 minutes
In space
199 days, 15 hours, 6 minutes
Bio
Tokarev entered the cosmonaut corps through the Buran program, where Soviet and Russian planners needed pilots who could handle winged spacecraft and complex orbital operations. After Buran ended, he remained in the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center as a test cosmonaut and shifted into joint ISS assignments.
His first spaceflight was STS-96 aboard Discovery in 1999, the first shuttle mission to dock with the International Space Station. Tokarev supported logistics transfer, station outfitting, and early assembly work before any resident crew had begun living aboard the station.
His second mission launched on Soyuz TMA-7 in 2005 for 12. Tokarev served with William McArthur for a two-person station expedition, performed two , and helped keep ISS operations moving during the period when shuttle flights were still recovering after Columbia.