| Korean Astronaut Program | |
|---|---|
| Hangul | 한국우주인배출사업 |
| Hanja | 韓國宇宙人排出事業 |
| Revised Romanization | Hanguk ujuin baechul saeop |
| McCune–Reischauer | Hankuk uchuin paech'ul saŏp |
The Korean Astronaut Program was an initiative by the South Korean government to send the first Korean into space via the Russian space program.
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On December 25, 2006, two candidates, one woman and one man, were selected by South Korea during a ceremony held at SBS television center in Dungchon-dong, Seoul. This choice was the result of a comprehensive selection process which started with the screening of 36,000 applications.[1]
This winning pair was sent to Russia early 2007 to undergo a 15-month training course at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center near Moscow.
On September 5, 2007, Ko San was named as the prime candidate, whilst Yi So-yeon served as his backup.[4] However, on March 10, 2008 it was announced that the prime candidate was changed to Yi So-yeon due to several violations of training protocol by Ko San. Ko San served as backup.[5]
On April 8, 2008 Yi So-yeon took off from the Baikonur [7] space center in Kazakhstan at 11:16 GMT aboard Soyuz TMA-12. She spent ten days conducting scientific experiments aboard the International Space Station.[6]
It cost South Korea approximately 26 billion won (28 million USD) to pay for the training and spaceflight.
The eight other finalists were: