Live coverage: Japanese cargo craft arrives at space station

Two days after launching from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, three new crew members arrived Friday at the International Space Station to begin a six-month stay. Docking of the crew’s Soyuz MS-09 spacecraft to the station’s Rassvet module occurred at 9:01 a.m. EDT (1301 GMT).

Soprano and would-be space tourist Sarah Brightman, who was in training for a flight to the International Space Station this fall aboard a Russian Soyuz ferry craft, will not be chasing her dream aloft after all.

Japanese officials halted a countdown Monday at the Tanegashima Space Center when teams overseeing preparations for launch of an H-2A rocket detected a nitrogen gas leak, prompting the return of the launcher and its Japanese government payload to a nearby assembly building for repairs.