Expedition 29 Press Conference (201111120021HQ)

Expedition 29 was the 29th long-duration expedition to the International Space Station (ISS). The expedition formally began on 16 September 2011, with the departure from the ISS of the Soyuz TMA-21 spacecraft. Astronauts Satoshi Furukawa, Michael Fossum and Sergey Volkov, who had arrived at the ISS aboard Soyuz TMA-02M in June 2011, began their Expedition 29 service at this time.

Soyuz TMA-22, which brought the remaining three Expedition 29 crew members to the ISS, was originally scheduled to launch in September 2011, but due to the launch failure of the Progress M-12M resupply vehicle on 24 August, its launch was delayed to 14 November. It docked successfully with the ISS on 16 November 2011.

Expedition 29 officially ended with the undocking of Soyuz TMA-02M on 21 November 2011. Furukawa, Fossum, and Volkov returned to Earth aboard the spacecraft, while astronauts Dan Burbank, Anton Shkaplerov, and Anatoli Ivanishin remained on the ISS as part of Expedition 30.