Anton Shkaplerov — watch collection

About Anton Shkaplerov’s watch collection

Anton Shkaplerov is a veteran Russian cosmonaut and test pilot who has spent more time in orbit than most people spend on long-haul flights in a lifetime. Born in 1972 in Sverdlovsk, he graduated from the Kharkov Higher Military Aviation School and later joined the Cosmonaut Corps in 1997. He has commanded three separate missions to the International Space Station — Expeditions 29, 50, and 66 — logging well over 500 days in space across four spaceflights. Beyond his mission roles, Shkaplerov has performed multiple spacewalks in the Russian Orlan suit and served as ISS commander during some of the station's most operationally complex periods. He is widely regarded within the spaceflight community as one of the most experienced active cosmonauts of his generation.

The Anton Shkaplerov watch collection, as far as public sightings go, points to a man who reaches for purpose-built tool watches rather than dress pieces. The single confirmed sighting is a striking one: during a live NASA TV broadcast of a spacewalk on January 19, 2022, Shkaplerov was seen wearing a Panerai Luminor Submersible PAM00210 strapped over his Orlan spacesuit. The PAM00210 is a discontinued reference from the mid-2000s built around a 44mm cushion-shaped steel case, a unidirectional rotating bezel, and Panerai's hand-wound P.9000-era predecessor movement. It is a serious diver's watch — water resistant to 300 metres — which makes its appearance in the vacuum of low Earth orbit both incongruous and entirely fitting for a man who treats extreme environments as a professional routine.

What the sighting reflects is a preference for watches with a clear functional identity. The Panerai Luminor Submersible is not a subtle choice; its case dimensions and crown-protecting bridge make it immediately readable even in bulky gear. Choosing a discontinued Panerai reference over the Speedmaster — the near-universal standard for astronaut wristwear — also suggests a collector's independence. Whether Shkaplerov owns additional references remains undocumented in our database, but the PAM00210 alone marks him as one of the more unexpected Panerai sightings in spaceflight history.