Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko celebrates the dawn of the Sputnik space age in Porto

Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko is in Porto to mark 58 years of the first human spaceflight in History, when the Russian Yuri Gagarin was the first man to be put on the Earth orbit, on 12 April 1961.

The veteran cosmonaut and flight engineer was welcomed by Mayor of Porto, Rui Moreira at Porto City Hall, taking into consideration the excellent nature of the diplomatic relations between the Russian Embassy in Portugal and the Municipality of Porto, namely the support that Porto City Hall grants to Russian cultural projects.

It is worth mentioning the 240 years of diplomatic relations between both countries, which are commemorated this year.

Mikhail Borisovich Kornienko served as a flight engineer on the International Space Station during Expedition 23/24 and was selected along with the American Scott Kelly for a year-long mission aboard the ISS.

Kornienko began the year long mission in March 2015, blasting off on Soyuz TMA-16M. In November 2012, NASA, the Roscosmos (Russian Federal Space Agency) and their international partners selected two veteran spacefarers, Kelly and Kornienko, respectively for a one-year mission aboard the International Space Station in 2015.

This mission included collecting scientific data that is key to future human exploration in space. Both cosmonauts were launched aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan in March 2015 and landed about one year later, on 1 March 2016.

Mikhail Kornienko will also attend the presentation of the "Sputnik-1", a project of the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Porto, scheduled to take place on 12 April, which is the International Day of manned space flight, as well as the anniversary of the first mission by the Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, on board the "Vostok 1", on 12 April 1961.