Live coverage: Three-man crew closes out 173-day space mission

Two days after blasting off on a Long March rocket, a Shenzhou spaceship carrying two Chinese astronauts linked up with China’s Tiangong 2 space lab nearly 250 miles above Earth Tuesday to begin a one-month stay inside the mini-station.

Russia’s Progress supply ship got an upgrade with a successful cargo launch to the International Space Station on Monday to kick off a two-day flight to the complex with more than 2.8 tons of equipment, propellant and water.

A Japanese cargo freighter launched Saturday on a five-day trek to the International Space Station, carrying a set of six replacement batteries, an experimental life support system, and a small new landing craft to bring specimens from the space station back to Earth.