VIDEO: Expedition 42-43 mission preview

Riding a specialized railroad car before dawn Friday, a Soyuz rocket rolled out of a cavernous assembly building and arrived at its launch pad at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan for liftoff Sunday with American, Russian and Italian crew members heading for the International Space Station.

A three-member space crew returned to Earth just after sunrise Thursday in Kazakhstan, descending through a sun-splashed sky under an orange and white parachute before dipping through fog for a rocket-cushioned touchdown on the snowy steppes of Central Asia.

This time lapse video shows Europe’s Automated Transfer Vehicle backing away from the International Space Station for the last time Saturday.