On 12 April 2019, the Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre (MBRSC) announced that it had selected Hazza Al Mansouri as the prime astronaut for an eight-day mission to the International Space Station (ISS).[2] This will make him the first Emirati in space and the first Arab aboard the ISS. He will go on 25 September 2019 on board the Soyuz-MS15 spacecraft which will blast off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, returning to Earth aboard a Soyuz-MS 12 on 3 October 2019. The mission was initially scheduled in April 2019 but was postponed to 25 September 2019 following a launch accident of the Soyuz-MS 10 spacecraft on 10 October 2018.