In 2000, Soyuz TM-31 opened the Soyuz route to the International Space Station.
Soyuz TM-31 carried Yuri Guidzenko, Sergei Krikalev and William Shepherd into space on a Soyuz-U rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome. The craft completed 3,040 orbits and landed in Kazakhstan on May 6, 2001.