Video: Change of command aboard International Space Station

Two days after blasting off from Kazakhstan, three new crew members docked with the International Space Station early Saturday to begin nearly four months of scientific experiments and maintenance on the orbiting research outpost. The Soyuz spacecraft linked up with the space station’s Rassvet module at 12:06 a.m. EDT (0406 GMT).

A cosmonaut and two NASA astronauts finished packing up their Soyuz ferry ship Wednesday and prepared to undock from the International Space Station early Thursday for a fiery descent to touchdown on the steppe of Kazakhstan to close out a 197-day mission that included four spacewalks, a full slate of research and an emergency leak repair.

These video replays show the liftoff of the Soyuz rocket carrying Oleg Kononenko, David Saint-Jacques and Anne McClain away from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, toward a rendezvous with the International Space Station around six hours later.