 On November 23, 2014, Soyuz TMA-15M carrying Virts, Samantha Cristoforetti and Anton Shkaplerov launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan.It successfully docked at the International Space Station roughly six hours later.On February 28, 2015, following the death of "Star Trek" actor, Leonard Nimoy, who played Spock, Virts tweeted an image from the International Space Station of his Vulcan Cohanim-inspired salute, improvised by the late actor when he was asked to portray an alien life form's desire that others live long and prosper, as the ISS flew over Boston, the city of the actor's birth.